GERMAN PLAi 
NEXT WAR 



J'BvM. GARDINER 




Class ii G" I 6 ^ 
Book.Jxl5_ 



CQEZRIGHT OEPOSm 



GERMAN PLANS 
FOR THE NEXT WAR 



GERMAN PLANS 
FOR THE NEXT WAR 



BY 



J. B. W. GARDINER 

The Military Critic of the "N. Y. Times" 




MAPS IN TEXT 



GARDEN CITY NEW YORK 

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

1918 



■^ 






Copyright, igi8, by 

DOUBLEDAY, PaGE & COMPANY 

AU rights reserved, including that of 

translation into foreign languages, 

including the Scandinavian 



m2\ I9i8 

O)C!.A4904:28 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. German Aims in Europe and Asia . 3 

II. Germany's Plans for the Future 

Revealed 23 

III. Despoliation of Belgium Systematic 

and Not Wanton 40 

IV. Calais-Bagdad not Hamburg-Bagdad 

the German Aim 63 

V. "World Empire or Downfall" . 84 

VI. Germany's Peace Drives — Past and 

TO Come 96 

VII. German Hostility to the United 

States Before the Present War 107 

VIII. No Peace Without Victory . . . 124 



LIST OF MAPS 

Page 
Mines That Are the Test of Victory ... 36' 

The Destruction of Belgium 57 

Geography of Serbian Exile 73 

Russia and the Resources Germany Means to 
Organize for her own Benefit .... 88-89 



GERMAN PLANS 
FOR THE NEXT WAR 



GERMAN PLANS 
FOR THE NEXT WAR 

CHAPTER 1 

GERMAN AIMS IN EUROPE AND ASIA 

The development of the present German Empire 
into the great but unscrupulous power which 
planned and initiated the Great War began 
with the Austro-Prussian war of 1866. This was 
the beginning of the Prussian lust for power and 
conquest, the beginning of the policy of aggres- 
sion which found its crystallization in 1914. 

Immediately after defeating Austria, Prussia 
formed the North German Confederation, a 
loose and unstable combination of the German 
states, merely as a necessary step in the develop- 
ment of German power in Europe. This com- 
bination was not intended to be permanent; it 
had none of the characteristics of a permanent 
organization. But it was necessary as a prepara- 
tory measure, preparing the German mind for a 

3 



4 German Plans for the Next War 

more closely knit union of states which was to 
follow. 

The plan was Prussia's, and Prussia meant to 
assume the lead, meant to be the dominating 
element in all Germany. The other states needed 
to become accustomed to Prussia's leading strings 
before the eventual permanent state was formed. 

The final step was soon taken. Gathering clouds 
of war with France furnished both the reason and 
the excuse, and under the guidance of Prussia, 
the North German Confederation was turned in- 
to the German Empire. The war with France 
taught the new German Empire that war could 
be an extremely profitable enterprise. 

The taste of power and of the fruits of victory 
which Germany obtained in 1871 soon developed 
into gluttonous desire. Under the guidance of 
Bismarck, the first to dream of Pan-Germanv, 
the campaign for universal empire began. 

The first step in the campaign was to educate 
the German people to the idea. This was done by 
intensive propaganda, which was launched by 
a school of philosophy headed by Nietzsche, a 
school which preached incessantly the righteous- 
ness of war for the sake of war, and the duty of a 
nation to wage war lest, in addiction to the arts of 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 5 

peace, a people should become weak and effem- 
inate, and their progress retarded. "Ye shall 
love peace," said Nietzsche, "as a means to new 
wars: and the short peace rather than the long." 
And this summed up the dogma of the entire 
school of which he was such a powerful exponent. 

This idea took root and soon there were hun- 
dreds of men in Germany expounding the same 
doctrine in the name of the Fatherland. Not a 
single avenue, which might lead to the extension 
of the idea of the righteousness of brute force, 
of the duty of might to overrule right, was 
neglected. In almost every leading university, in 
almost every school and from almost every pulpit 
these ideas were taught and disseminated, until 
all of Germany was rotten with their insidious 
poison. The Pan-German party therefore lived 
and thrived and with widely extended member- 
ship, spread over the entire empire, taking 
supremacy in all matters of state, in spite of 
the growth of socialism. 

Under the present Kaiser, the Pan-German 
dream was reduced to a definite form and definite 
steps were taken to turn this dream into a reality. 
These steps consisted in secret preparations for 
war, a war which Germany proposed to launch 



6 German Plans for the Next War 

as soon as she felt the chances for success were 
most favorable. The time was ripe in 1914 and the 
Serajevo incident furnished the excuse. 

It is not the intention here to enter into a 
discussion of the origin of the great war. It is, 
indeed, unnecessary, since it has been proven 
beyond all doubt that the war owes its begin- 
ning to Germany, to German ambition, to Ger- 
man lust for power and gain. But in this con- 
nection, I will do no more than quote Maximilian 
Harden, who, in 1914, not only acknowledged 
the truth, but defended it. 

"This war," he writes, "has not been forced 
on us by surprise; we desired it and were right to 
do so. Germany goes into it because of her im- 
mutable conviction that what she has accom- 
plished gives her the right to wider outlets for 
her activities and more room in the world." 
These "wider outlets," this "more room in the 
world," are the dreams of the Pan-Germ anist, 
the distinct aims for which Germany is now at 
war. 

It is popularly considered that the Pan-Ger- 
manic doctrine led to an expansion of Germany 
only toward the east, that the Hamburg-Persian 
Gulf line, the line of the Oriental railroad and 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 7 

its bordering lands, was the limit of German 
ambitions. This was the Pan-German ambition 
of 1895; it is not the ambition of 191 2, the ambi- 
tion which led Bernhardi, the disciple of Nietzsche, 
to plead for world power or downfall. This latter 
dream extended westward as well as eastward, 
to the coast of France and Belgium as well as to 
the shores of the Persian Gulf. This is borne out 
by the fact that Germany, who in her plans for 
war had carefully calculated every step, delib- 
erately selected thewestern front as the main scene 
of military endeavor. A brief analysis of this 
selection will show why the conclusion that 
Germany intended to expand westward is in- 
evitable. 

At the outset we may lay down the undebatable 
theory of warring against coalitions, that the 
only way to win is, as Napoleon did on several 
occasions, break the coalition and defeat its 
component parts separately. In the particular 
case at hand, Germany found herself faced with 
France on the west and Russia on the east. 
Great Britain, Germany hoped might stay out 
of this war and would be attended to later. The 
logical move then was to strike against the 
weaker member of the enemy, defeat it, force a 



8 German Plans for the Next War 

separate peace, and then turn on the other. 
Either wing, if struck suddenly with the full force 
of Germany, unhampered and undiverted by any 
danger from the other, would, before defensive 
mobilization could be effected, be crushed and 
crumpled like a house of cards. 

Let us then examine the relative strength of 
eastern and western enemies of Germany on 
August I, 1914, in order to determine on which 
front the logic of the situation demanded that 
Germany should strike. France, through her 
system of compulsory military service, was 
already well recruited. Her standing army was 
nearly a million men, and her plans for mobili- 
zation could bring to the colors an additional 
force equally as large. Moreover, having since 
1 871 had reason to fear Germany, she was more 
or less prepared for the struggle. There was the 
string of border fortresses for defense — ^Verdun, 
Nancy, Epinal, Belfort — stretching out from 
Luxemburg to the Swiss frontier blocking the 
passage of the Vosges mountains. There was an 
excellent system of railroads and highways, 
second not even to those of Germany, over which 
troops could be moved with great rapidity. 
There was a long sea coast studded with open 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 9 

ports into which the factories of the world could 
pour their munitions, supplementing those of 
the industries of France. There was the French 
n^Lvy, second to that of Germany, possibly, but 
capable of protecting the country's shipping. 
Finally there was that intangible force — difficult 
to measure and to define but of incalculable 
value — the spirit of France, a spirit which Ger- 
many knew existed and which, in intensity, is 
not less strong than the German devotion to 
the Fatherland. Indeed this spirit had many 
times proven itself to be one of the most powerful 
forces in history; a force which never flags, that 
knows no defeat, that fights beyond the point 
where hope is dead, — and still wins. 

These were, briefly, the forces, excluding Great 
Britain, which Germany had to face when she 
decided to strike to the west. 

There were no such forces as these in Russia. 
The Russian bureaucracy, in the first place, 
was made up of men the great majority of whom 
were from the Baltic provinces and who were 
pro-Teuton in their sympathies rather than 
pro-Slav. The Russian people were not united, 
the spirit of patriotism was weak, there was an 
absence of any national ideal by which the people 



lo German Plans for the Next War 

were united into that solidarity so essential to 
the prosecution of a war. Manufacturing re- 
sources were limited and unorganized, and were 
concentrated for the most part in Russian Poland, 
west of the Vistula. Russia could, moreover, 
be cut off from the seas except at Vladivostok, 
from which the traffic is limited by a single and 
very long railroad haul. Thus Russia was chiefly 
dependent for supplies and munitions on her 
domestic manufactures, except during the sum- 
mer weather, when the White Sea ports would 
be open. In addition to this, Austria, Germany's 
ally, was cut off completely from participating 
in an attack on France, her territory stretching 
squarely across Russia's southern flank in Poland. 
From this accident of geography, Austria, if 
Germany could engage Russia's attention on the 
Poland frontier, could outflank the Russian army 
at all points along the Galician boundary. 

Had Germany struck eastward against Russia, 
instead of westward against Belgium and France, 
what would have been the result.'' In the first 
place England proposed to Germany that, if she 
would preserve the neutrality of Belgium and 
direct no offensive against the northern coast of 
France, she would remain neutral. There would 



German Aims in Europe and Asia ii 

also have been a great difference in the attitude 
of France. 'France unquestionably would have 
lived up to her treaty with Russia. But there 
was a strong pro-German party in France at 
the time, and this party, if the sacred soil of 
France had remained untouched, would have 
been extremely powerful. France with the Ger- 
mans on her soil is one thing; France with her 
soil unscarified by the German heel is another. 
The war in France would not have been popular 
and the spirit which has meant so much to 
France and to the Entente would have for the 
most part been lacking. Russia, in such case, 
would have received the full force of a blow 
delivered with the combined strength of Germany 
and Austria. 

We saw, between April and November 191 5, 
what such a condition would bring about. Ger- 
many, although holding long lines in the west, 
turned on Russia, and in this short time all but 
eliminated her from the war. Had this blow 
been delivered nine months earlier with the 
additional men Germany would have had at her 
command through confining herself to defensive 
action against France, the entire Russian army 
could have been destroyed, and the Germans 



12 German Plans for the Next War 

could have taken the Russian capital. An inde- 
pendent peace would then have followed, and 
Germany would have been left free to deal with 
France. When matters had reached this stage 
France, which entered the war only to fulfill 
her treaty, also would have made peace, and the 
war would have been over within six months. 
Germany's rule in the east would have been 
unquestioned, the Russian menace would have 
been completely done away with, and the Ham- 
burg-Persian Gulf right of way secured, for 
Turkey was already in German grasp. 

Why was this not done ? Why, if the German 
dream led only from Hamburg to Bagdad, did 
Germany strike west when there were such 
overwhelming advantages in locating the war 
in the east? Why did Germany deliberately 
flaunt Great Britain and risk drawing her into 
the war, when, by turning to the east instead of 
the west. Great Britain would have remained 
neutral? Why did Germany ignore the fact that 
in 1914 France, if not invaded, would have with- 
drawn from the war if Russia had made peace, 
since France only entered the war through her 
treaty with Russia? 

To all of these questions we can find but the 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 13 

one answer. It is that, in beginning the war, 
Germany looked to a westward expansion as 
fully equal in importance to an eastward exten- 
sion of her sphere of influence. She figured that 
by coming down through Belgium, she could 
take Calais, and gain control of the Belgian 
coast from the Franco-Belgian frontier to Hol- 
land. She figured that she would flank the forti- 
fications of Verdun which had been constructed 
to defend against an attack from the east but not 
from the north, break a gap in the French defen- 
sive line at this point, reach Paris, and force on 
France a peace which would give Germany the 
French iron mines of Longwy and of Brie. She 
figured that the possession of the important 
strategic coastal cities would place her in position 
to begin a colonial policy, a policy of expansion 
over the entire world. With her guns pointed at 
England's throat from Antwerp, Ostend and 
Calais, she meant to begin the attack on the 
far flung British Empire. 

Master then of three-quarters of all of the iron 
of Europe, France reduced to a second or third 
rate power, Germany could then begin a naval 
development which would eventually wrest from 
England the title of Mistress of the Seas and 



14 German Plans for the Next War 

place Germany in control of the world on land 
and sea. "World Power or Downfall," said 
Bernhardi in 191 2. But how could world power 
be reached without destroying France, and render- 
ing England impotent? No, the Pan-German 
dream was not Hamburg to Bagdad, but Calais 
to Bagdad. 

Once France was conquered, Germany con- 
sidered that it would be very simple to deal 
with the eastern phase of Pan-Germania. Russia 
would not last three months. Petrograd was 
swamped with sedition; every Russian council 
was filled with German spies; the Russian 
Premier himself was a German agent; the Russian 
qu€en, sister of the Kaiser, was loyal to her 
brother's interests. Russia was without immedi- 
ately available iron and coal, without sufficient 
factories; she had not the equipment with which 
to wage war. In six months Russia would have 
become as truly a German vassal as she is now, 
Serbia would have been eliminated, and the 
eastern boundary of Germany would have become 
conterminous with the western boundary of 
Persia. German domination of both the European 
and Asiatic continents would now be complete. 

The bibliography of Pan-Germania is replete 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 15 

with allusions to this ambition. Lest, however, 
the charge be made that quotations from Pan- 
German writers have been selected prejudicially 
and without regard to the general context from 
which they are taken, I have first tried to show 
the working of the Pan-German scheme in actual 
operation. We may, however, turn now to this 
bibliography, to the schemes advanced by the 
Pan-German writers as a means of proving that 
this idea of a western expansion is combined, 
in the German plan, with the extension of Ger- 
manic influence into the Near East. Through 
this channel, we may at the same time trace the 
rapid development of the Pan-Germanic theory, 
the demands of which in 1895 were extremely 
modest as compared with the land hunger as it 
exists to-day. 

"We must create a Central Europe," said Paul 
de Lagarde, writing in 1905, "which will guar- 
antee the peace of the entire continent from the 
moment when it shall have driven the Russians 
from the Black Sea and the Slavs from the south, 
and shall have conquered large tracts to the east 
of our frontiers for German colonization. We 
cannot let loose, ex abruptOy the war which will 
create this Central Europe. All we can do is to 



i6 German Plans for the Next War 

accustom our people to the thought that this 
war must come." And at this juncture we might 
interpolate that the process of driving the Rus- 
sians from the Black Sea, through the German- 
ization of the new state of Ukraine, is going on 
apace, and that the Slavs have already been 
driven from the south. Therefore this element 
in the foundation of the Central European 
Empire has already become a fact. 

Writing in the same year, and showing the 
desires of Pan-Germanists westward, another 
Pan-German writer, Joseph Ludwig Reimer, has 
this to say with reference to all of Germany's 
smaller neighbors: 

"Such false ideas as to nationality, speech and 
race are prevalent ... that it is often main- 
tained that no breaking up of nations would be 
necessary, but that a 'Germanization' in the 
mass of the nations in question (Germany's 
smaller neighbors) would be sufficient.'* 

And the same writer, later on, in his book, "A 
Pan-German Germany, " from which the above 
extract was taken, makes this definite proposal, 
which, be it noted, strikes westward at Holland: 

"We desire, and must desire ... a world- 
empire of Teutonic stock, under the hegemony 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 17 

of the German people. In order to secure this 
we must — 

{a) Gradually Germanize the Scandinavian and 

Dutch Teutonic States, denationalizing 

them in the weaker significance of the term; 

{h) Break up the predominantly un-Teutonic 

peoples into their component parts, in 

order to take to ourselves the Teutonic 

element and Germanize it, while we reject 

the un-Teutonic element.'* 

Professor Ernst Hasse, writing in 1906, carries 

this idea somewhat further along the course it 

has since taken: 

"The territory open to future German expansion 
. . . must extend from the North Sea and the 
Baltic to the Persian Gulf, absorbing the Nether- 
lands and Luxemburg, Switzerland, the whole 
basin of the Danube, the Balkan Peninsula and 
Asia Minor." 

In 191 1, to come nearer down to the present 
day, Maximilian Harden, whose word is partic- 
ularly valuable in view of the position he has 
taken on German war aims since 191 5, empha- 
sized the German intention to spread toward the 
Atlantic : 

"Since the Western Powers restrict our right to 



1 8 German Plans for the Next War 

life, it is necessary that we should attach one of 
them to us, or that we should sweep them out 
of our way by force." 

Which one was to be attached? Why "sweep 
them out of our way by force " unless it was to 
expand westward? Belgium was in Harden's 
mind; Belgium and probably France as well, 
since they are the only two powers west of Grer- 
many that in any way hindered Germany's 
growth; Belgium, from the fact that she pos- 
sessed a sea coast; France, partly for the same 
reason, and partly because of her economic 
importance and military strength. 

And finally let us quote the official corrobora- 
tion of the German plan to expand westward, as 
well as eastward and southeast. 

A German socialist deputy obtained and read 
in the German Reichstag a secret memorandum 
sent by Chancellor Michaelis to Austria in 
1 91 6. This memorandum contained the follow- 
ing passages: 

"The motive of all of Germany's acts is the lack 
of territory, both for the development of commerce 
and colonization. Germany has to solve two 
problems — the freedom of the seas and the opening 
of a route to the southeast. And these two problems 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 19 

can only be solved through the destruction of 
England. 

"Our object is the permanent securing of the 
German Empire in Central Europe and the extension 
of its territory. No one who understands the sig- 
nificance of this war can doubt that, in spite of 
our wish to be moderate, we shall not allow our- 
selves to be deterred from extending the borders 
of the empire and from, under all circumstances, 
annexing such territories as are fitted for coloniza- 
tion and are not subjected to the influence of the 
sea power. 

"We can weaken her (Russia) materially by taking 
away her border territories, the Baltic provinces. 
By using skillful policies the Baltic provinces can 
easily be Germanized. They will be settled with 
Germans and their population will double itself. 
That is the reason why they must be annexed. 
The frontier between the German Empire 
and Poland must be materially altered. . . . 
The lakes, which we shall not leave in the hands 
of the Russians at any price, will be included 
within our borders. 

"In the Vosges the boundary line must be im- 
proved by the annexation of some valleys, so that 
the German frontier troops can no longer be fired 
upon from French territory. France will lose Briey 
and a strip of land west of Luxemburg. The value 
of Briey in an economic and military sense is evi- 
dent from the fact that 16,000,000 tons of iron ore 



20 German Plans for the Next War 

are produced there. For the safeguarding of the 
German and Luxemburg iron industry Longwy 
must remain in our hands." 

It is not necessary to continue these quota- 
tions further. 

The quotations which have been used are 
sufficient to show that the Pan-German scheme 
did include the annexing of part at least of France 
and Belgium and later the destruction of Eng- 
land; and the fact that, contrary to all the logic 
of the situation, the action of the German Govern- 
ment at the beginning of the war in attacking 
through France and Belgium was in direct further- 
ance of the Pan-German plan. It is unnecessary 
to take up the matter of expansion toward the 
east. This is not because their intention to 
expand eastward and establish the Hamburg- 
Bagdad control is not of equal importance. Indeed 
in so far as the peace of Europe — present and 
future — is concerned, it is of even greater impor- 
tance, since if the eastern object of the Pan- 
German scheme be frustrated, the entire plan 
falls to the ground. But as the military situation 
stands, the eastern phase is practically a fait 
accompli. Serbia has been demolished and the 
Belgrade-Nish link in the Oriental Railroad is 



German Aims in Europe and Asia 21 

secured; Bulgaria and Turkey are totally sub- 
dued through economic dependence and are in all 
things subservient to their Teutonic masters; 
Austria remains, as she has been since the begin- 
ning, a German vassal. A part of Palestine and 
of eastern Mesopotamia as far as Bagdad is, 
it is true, in British hands; but Russia has 
failed, the British are alone in their fight, and 
the activities of their two forces can not decide 
the war. 

But whatever of the German ambition in 
the Near East remains unachieved through these 
British forces, it has been more than compen- 
sated for by the annexations in Russia. The 
German gains east of the Prussian frontier have 
opened a vista far beyond the wildest dreams 
of the most rabid Pan-Germanist; and what 
Germany has already acquired will not be released 
unless Germany is forced, by force of arms, to 
disgorge. 

The situation in the west is essentially different. 
What Germany holds in France and Belgium 
falls irreparably short of her ambitions. More- 
over, not only is she unable to go farther, but 
that which she has will certainly be taken away, 
and, sooner or later, she must eventually fall back 



22 German Plans for the Next War 

behind her own frontiers. If this were to come 
about through a peace compromise the result would 
merely be an armed truce. The German ambition 
for western expansion would merely sleep to awake 
later in another, and more terrible war. There- 
fore I have emphasized the western situation 
since, because of its relation to the future, it is 
the most pregnant with danger. 



CHAPTER II 
Germany's plans for the future revealed 

In presenting the evidence that Germany's 
thought is already projecting itself into another 
war, that preparations are already being not 
only actively considered but actually made, I 
shall purposely refrain from selecting data 
froxn the German press. This press has, for the 
past two years, been filled with such references, 
but the press of any country is not conclusive 
evidence of that country's intentions or of the 
purposes of its leaders. We may say that a 
certain paper is the organ of this or of that party 
and that its utterances may therefore be con- 
sidered as having an atmosphere of official 
sanction. This, however, is open to dispute. The 
object here is not to delve into the realm of con- 
troversial matters but to present only those 
things which are known to be facts. From such 
facts, and we cannot dispute facts, we are at 
liberty to draw conclusions and to act on the 

23 



24 German Plans for the Next War 

logical consequences of the facts as being the 
most probable state of affairs with which we have 
to contend. From official Germany herself, 
through the medium of prominent German offi- 
cials who are known and recognized as such over 
the entire reading world, we have outspoken and 
frank statements as to just how the German mind 
is working at this moment. 

Lieutenant-General Baron von Freytag-Loring- 
hoven. Deputy Chief of the German General 
Staff, ranks officially as the third soldier in the 
German Empire. He is the most distinguished 
writer in the German army, and the only officer, 
since the war began, to be decorated with the 
Ordre Pour le Merite, Peace Class, which is 
conferred for distinction in science and arts. A 
word as to the personal characteristics of this 
officer will give an idea as to how much weight 
we may place upon what he has to say. He is 
distinctly not of the swaggering, swashbuckling, 
boastful type of German officer so frequently 
met with, in peace days, in the streets of Berlin 
and of the other German cities. On the contrary, 
he is distinctly of the student type, arguing 
dispassionately, and appreciating with commen- 
datory fairness and sincerity the good qualities 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 25 

and fighting ability of Germany's present ene- 
mies, and of the probable enemies of the future. 
For the past tv/o or three years he has been 
regarded as the mouthpiece of the German 
army, and it may therefore be assumed that what 
he has to say bears at least the imprint of approval 
from military Germany. 

He has furnished us with a book entitled 
"Deductions from the World War," in which he 
discusses broadly and calmly the applications of 
this war's lessons to the next, and what prepara- 
tions Germany must make so that the errors of 
the present conflict may not be repeated when 
the next war is launched. His book was never 
intended to reach either neutral countries or 
Germany's enemies. It was written entirely for 
German consumption and German benefit. Its 
circulation was greatly encouraged by the Ger- 
man Government, but because of the writer's 
candor in avowing Germany's intention to pre- 
pare for the next war as soon as circumstances 
permit, all newspaper criticism was prohibited 
by the censor and the export of the book abso- 
lutely forbidden. A few copies, however, managed 
to leak through the barriers imposed by the 
Government and the book has been translated 



26 German Plans for the Next War 

and published in Great Britain and the United 
States. 

Baron von Freytag-Loringhoven first discusses 
the general question of peace, of disarmaments, 
and of arbitration. Incidentally it may be noted 
he has made reference to Germany's intention to 
obtain world power, about which so much has 
been written : 

"It may be asked, What is the use of all this? 
Will not the general exhaustion of Europe, after 
the world conflagration, of a certainty put the 
danger of a new war, to begin with, in the back- 
ground, and does not this terrible slaughter of 
nations point inevitably to the necessity of dis- 
armaments to pave the way to permanent peace? 
The reply to that is that nobody can undertake 
to guarantee a long period of peace and that a 
lasting peace is guaranteed only by strong arma- 
ments. Our own armament, although it may have 
been defective in some respects, has none the less 
secured peace for us for forty years, that is to 
say, for such a length of time as has hardly ever 
before been experienced in the world's history 
in the case of a great country." 

Here not only is cleverly and plausibly laid 
down an excuse to the German people for the 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 27 

remarkable state of military preparedness and 
for their huge ante-war expenditures, but with 
equal cleverness, the mind is prepared for a 
continuation of this condition after the present 
war is over. But to continue the quotation. 

"Moreover, world power is inconceivable with- 
out striving for expression of power in the world, 
and consequently for sea power. But this involves 
the constant existence of a large number of 
potential causes of friction. Hence arises the 
necessity for adequate armaments on land and 
sea. ... A long peace, such as that which pre- 
ceded the World War, had frequently caused us 
to overlook the fact that it was not the fine 
phrases about international bliss and brotherhood, 
uttered on every occasion at public meetings, 
which preserved us from war, but the might of our 
sword, which was only fully revealed on the out- 
break of hostilities. And it will only be by this 
might that we shall be able to safeguard peace 
in the future." 

If we had the slightest reason to believe in Ger- 
many's good faith; if we did not know that she 
is unscrupulous, deceitful, without any con- 
ceptions of national honor as that term is under- 
stood by the civilized people of the world; if 



28 German Plans for the Next War 

Germany's history did not prove that she cannot 
have power without abusing it, we might interpret 
the latter part of the last quotation as a reason- 
able step for the preservation of the nation. But 
it is Germany's abuse of power that we have 
learned to fear; not her use of it. And with our 
knowledge of what Germany would do with 
military power in the future, should we be safe in 
permitting her to end the war with her military 
strength unimpaired, relatively stronger indeed 
than it was in 1914? In the same paragraph in 
which General von Freytag-Loringhoven demands 
a strong military body as a defensive measure, 
has he not expressly stated Germany's desire for 
world power? 

Later in his book he gives us again new cause 
for fear; insinuating, in terms so plain that it is 
impossible to mistake his meaning, just what the 
German attitude will be toward future treaties, 
which, in the mind of the military leaders, pre- 
vent German expansion. In the same extract 
we also learn something about the German 
opinion of a league of nations, banded together 
in the interests of peace: 

"We misconstrue reality, if we imagine that it 
is possible to rid the world of war by means of 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 29 

mutual agreements. Such agreements will, in 
the future as in the past, be concluded from time 
to time between states. The further development 
of international courts of arbitration and the 
elimination of many causes of dispute by their 
agency lie within the realms of possibility, but 
any such agreements will after all only be treaties 
which will not on every occasion be capable of 
holding in check forces seething within the states. 
... In any event, as regards us Germans, the 
World War should disencumber us once and for 
all of any vague cosmopolitan sentimentality. 
If our enemies, both our secret and our avowed 
enemies, make professions of this nature, that 
is for us sufficient evidence of the hypocrisy 
which underlies them." 

In taking up the present war and discussing 
German failures and mistakes he dwells at some 
length on the Battle of the Marne, Germany's 
first admission that there was such a battle or that 
a defeat was suffered in the first mad rush forward 
in 1914. 

The next war must be so planned, he informs 
us, that Germany may keep on the oflFensive 
and that there shall be no subsidence into trench 
warfare; a war of movement shall be maintained 



30 German Plans for the Next War 

from the outset. The Germans failed at the 
Marne because they were not strong enough to 
break down France, and this mistake must not 
occur in the next war, he tells us. 

"If at that time no decisive victory fell to our 
share, and our strength proved insufficient to 
vanquish France, we must none the less consider 
that up to the Marne we had achieved enormous 
things. 'In the very moment of accomplishment,' " 
he says, quoting a Swiss military critic, " 'the 
completion of the battle was abandoned for 
far-reaching general reasons. . . . The battle 
was broken off by the German Supreme Com- 
mand, and in view of the general situation, a 
strategic retreat to a new line was ordered.' 
This is the judgment of a neutral writer on the 
battle of the Marne, and certainly it would have 
taken very little to turn the scale so that victory 
might have fallen to us and a retreat been avoided. 
The withdrawal of the German armies after the 
dazzling successes which had been achieved at 
the beginning could not but in the nature of 
things cause bitter disappointment at home." 

He then lays down the guiding principles which 
shall actuate the German preparations for the 
next conflict; 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 3 1 

"Our business therefore is to maintain the 
fundamental ideas of war as they lived in the 
German army up to the year 191 4, to soak them 
in the experiences of the present war, and to 
make the fullest technical use of these experiences; 
but to do all this without giving an entirely 
new direction to our thinking on strategy and 
tactics." 

"We shall have to consider how, in future, 
to preserve for war the character of the war 
of movement, all the more so, since in the 
World War it has only been by the war of move- 
ment that we have reaped decisive results. It 
will, of course, be accompanied by many of the 
features of intrenched warfare, and, in conse- 
quence of the necessity of bringing up and setting 
in operation the numerous present-day methods 
of attack, it will be slow." 

"The spirit of the offensive which is peculiar 
to our army we must study to preserve by every 
means in our power. It has achieved striking 
results in this war, and has recently once again 
proved its effectiveness in the summer of 1917 
in Eastern Galicia and in the defensive battles 
in Northern France and Flanders." 

He seems to feel that there is a possibility of the 



32 German Plans for the Next War 

army being democratized, which from his point 
of view would be a German calamity. He there- 
fore makes use of the following quotation from 
Prince Buelow to prove his assertion: 

"The spirit of German militarism, as Prussia 
first developed it and Germany adopted it, is 
every whit as monarchical as it is aristocratic 
and democratic, and it would cease to be German, 
and the mighty expression of German imperial 
military power and military efficiency, were it to 
change. If our enemies, to whom with God's 
help our militarism will bring defeat, abuse it, 
we know that we must preserve it, for to us it 
means victory and the future of Germany." 

As to general conclusions, the following quota- 
tions will suffice. 

"The war has, on the one hand, revealed to us 
the full financial strength of Germany; but, on 
the other hand. It has proved that additional 
expenditure on the army at the right time would 
have been profitable. We should then have saved 
in this war not only millions of marks, but in 
all probability we should have had to offer up 
a far less considerable sacrifice of men. In view 
of the central position of the Fatherland, larger 
expenditure on the land-army. In addition to 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 33 

the necessary expenditures on the fleet, was 
absolutely essential. 

"The demands which in this connection were 
put before the Reichstag were but a feeble min- 
imum of what was really desirable, as the World 
War has proved. . . . We have to learn from 
it the lesson that in future we must disregard 
every objection, and must see to it that the dis- 
proportion between the credits which are asked 
for and what has to be done in case of war shall 
in any case never again be so great as it was in 
the World War. 

"In the future, as in the past, the German 
people will have to seek firm cohesion in its 
glorious army and in its belaureled young fleet." 

I have dilated to such an extent on this volume 
because the deliberation, the freedom from chau- 
vinistic tendencies, and the fairness of its reason- 
ing make it peculiarly impressive reading. The 
object of the volume is very plain. It is free from 
the slightest attempt to dissemble or to avoid 
the issue. It is simply to point out the errors which 
the present war has revealed, and to show how, in 
the preparations which are now under way for 
the next war, the mistakes of the present may 
be avoided. 



34 German Plans for the Next War 

We shall return later, in discussing Belgium, 
to the current military thought of Germany, 
but for the present we may dispense with it 
and see what civilian Germany thinks of these 
war preparations. 

In December 1917 the Association of German 
Manufacturers of Iron and Steel and the 
Association of German Metallurgists, with 
headquarters at Berlin and Diisseldorff, drew 
up a memorial which was addressed to the 
German Government and to the German High 
Military Command, demanding that Germany 
annex the French iron areas centering in 
Longwy and Briey because of their "extreme 
importance for German national economy and 
for the conduct of future wars." A copy of 
this memorial, which is in the hands of the 
French authorities, furnishes most positive 
evidence that the large commercial organi- 
zations of Germany are in exactly the same 
frame of mind as is the military element. 
The importance of the iron of Lorraine and of 
the Briey basin has of course been widely 
recognized. This indeed was the dominating 
element which inspired in Germany her desire 
for a western expansion which was discussed 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 35 

In the first part of this volume. This subject 
is gone into with elaborate care as is also the 
relation of both French and German Lorraine 
to the present war. **If, with the outbreak of 
hostilities in 1914, the French had destroyed 
their own iron mines of the Briey and Longwy 
basins, which later fell into the hands of the 
Germans, and at the same time with their long- 
range guns destroyed the iron mines on the 
German side of the Lorraine frontier, the 
war could not have lasted more than a few 
months." 

Continuing, this memorial demands that 
the frontier be pushed westward not only to 
include the present French iron deposits, but 
to place them beyond the range of the French 
artillery. Only in this way, it states, can 
France be prevented from checking Germany's 
future wars. 

Further, the memorial points out that the 
life of Germany's own deposits is not more 
than fifty years and concludes as a conse- 
quence: 

"Let no one believe that Germany in peace 
time will be able to assure herself iron reserves 
for a future war. And let no one dare to pretend 



36 German Plans for the Next War 



on his own responsibility that such iron re- 
serves would be sufficient. 

"During the first forty months of this war 




MINES THAT ARE THE TEST OF VICTORY 

The loss of the iron mines of Lorraine would mean, to Germany, 
the loss of more than half of her total supply of iron ore, upon 
which, in turn, depends the all-essential supply of guns, shells, 
and rails for the German Army. With .these mines in Allied 
hands, therefore, Germany could not long continue to prosecute 
the war 

Germany, in order to meet the needs of her 
national defense, spent over 50,000,000 tons of 
iron and steel. 

"We do not have the right to count that in 
a future war we will have the good fortune 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 37 

a second time to be able to exploit the terri- 
tories occupied and to increase our resources 
of first materials." 

Taking up the use of steel in the next war, 
and following in a general way the idea empha- 
sized so strongly by General von Freytag- 
Loringhoven, the memorial states: 

"For the future war it is necessary that we 
dispose of considerable resources in German 
ore, for the richer an industrial nation is in iron 
ore the greater it is feared by its enemies. 

"In the future it will not be masses of men 
grouped in gigantic armies that will decide the 
war, but above all defensive and offensive 
instruments of perfected technic placed at the 
disposition of the combatants in sufficient 
quantities and constantly renewed. 

LORRAINE AS A PROTECTION 

"It is thus that the mineral districts of 
Lorraine, to which we are already indebted 
for not having been annihilated in the present 
war, will protect us in the future war and permit 
us to assure the welfare of the empire and at 
the same time spare the blood of the people. 

"It is necessary to see in the seizure by 



38 German Plans for the Next War 

Germany of all of Lorraine not merely a war 
indemnity and a source of vigor for the father- 
land, but also a guarantee of a durable peace 
and of security for the fatherland." 

We thus have from the highest military 
source and from a civilian source equally high, 
frequent and emphatic references to what is in 
the German mind at this moment — and all 
corroborated by Chancellor Michaelis's memo- 
randum to Austria. If we wish to turn to the 
political factors and ascertain whether the 
politicians now in charge are in accord with 
the views expressed by these elements in the 
empire, it is but necessary to read Hertling's 
address before the Reichstag in February, an- 
swering President Wilson's peace principles. 
Hertling makes no mention, of course, of Ger- 
many's plans, yet at the same time his speech 
bristles with references to another war in 
which Germany must defend herself, and must 
therefore, as a means for defense, remain in 
possession of this or that part of Belgium. It 
is all indicative of a frame of mind, a mind 
which for years has been brought up on war 
and trained to think in terms of war. And all 
the German mind conceives to-day is a peace 



Germany's Plans for the Future Revealed 39 

which will enable the state to wage most 
effectively the next war in which it is engaged. 
Nothing is further from German purpose or 
German desire than to make a peace which 
will stabilize Europe, and lessen to a minimum 
the chances of future conflict. 



CHAPTER III 

DESPOLIATION OF BELGIUM SYSTEMATIC AND 
NOT WANTON 

German ambitions and the German plan to 
achieve them have been made clear in many 
ways, once the nucleus of the idea becomes 
established. German writers — commercial, mili- 
tary and political — have been kind enough to 
furnish us with the premises from which to 
reason. They have established for us the fact 
that the idea of another war is in the air, and 
that, in so far as the ruling classes — politically 
and financially — are concerned, it is a fixed 
idea. 

The question that now arises is: Has any- 
thing yet been done to translate this idea into 
facts, or has it died aborning, so to speak.'' In 
other words: Is there anything in what Ger- 
many has actually done since the war began that 
can be reasonably interpreted as bearing out 
the idea of preparation for another great war? 

40 



Despoliation of Belgium 41 

In this connection the sequence of events in 
both Belgium and France since 1914 is an 
interesting study. The first phase of the 
invasion of Belgium might be termed the 
period of atrocities. The crimes of the German 
army, crimes which were sanctioned by the 
highest German authorities and willingly com- 
mitted by the German soldiery, are generally 
known and have been amply testified to by 
many American authorities of unimpeachable 
veracity. There can be no doubt in the mind 
of any man, whose mind functions otherwise 
than in a strictly German fashion, that such 
crimes were committed. The horrors of the 
ravishing of Dinant, of Termonde, of Louvain, 
are indeed well established and, to some extent 
at least, will always remain fresh in our mind. 
These crimes held a very specific object quite 
in keeping with German military policy. This 
object was to so instill in the soul of the Belgian 
fear and terror of Germany and of all things 
German, that there should be no uprising, 
either in mass or on the part of individuals, 
against the invaders. It is only fair to acknowl- 
edge, however, that the atrocities which were 
committed were limited in area to the line of 



42 German Plans for the Next War 

advance of the army. Arson, rape, and plunder 
were the rule in this pathway, but outside of 
it little destruction was carried on. 

After the first battle of Ypres, however, when 
the war had settled down into trenches and 
the battle line had been established from 
Nieuport southward, German tactics changed. 
Then the German occupation was an established 
fact; there was small danger that, at least for 
some time to come, it would be interfered with. 
The German problem in Belgium ceased to be 
primarily military and became essentially one 
of administration — although an administration 
solely for German purposes and to serve Ger- 
man ends. 

The problem having changed, the methods 
also changed. The atrocities ceased; and, 
except in isolated cases such as the murder of 
Edith Cavell and the assassination of Capt. 
Fryatt, were heard of no longer. Germany, on 
the contrary, set about to reconstitute the 
Belgian industries which, naturally, had sus- 
pended operations, and to restore, in so far as 
it was possible, the ante-bellum commercial 
processes. It is true that the production of the 
factories was taken over by German authorities 



Despoliation of Belgium 43 

when it served their ends to do so; it is true 
that the agriculture of Belgium was converted 
to fill a German need; galling restrictions were 
placed upon the free movement of the people 
and the most rigid discipline was enforced. 
But nevertheless, the German rule was, accord- 
ing to German lights, decent, and generally- 
calculated to promote the welfare of the country 
if not of its citizens. Except for the exaction 
of outrageous and — if we may still refer to 
international law — illegal money indemnities 
and the sequestration of personal property 
without reimbursement, Germany made but 
little effort to interfere with the commercial 
processes of the conquered state. The general 
attitude was one which they intended to be 
one of encouragement. 

This was the second phase — the period of 
semi-peaceful occupation. But this, too, was 
all changed later and there was ushered in a 
third phase, a period marked by as systematic 
despoliation of all of Belgium's industry, the 
destruction of its commercial structure, the 
social annihilation of its population. These 
were brought about by events in the military 
theater. 



44 German Plans for the Next War 

Until June 1916 German military leaders 
retained their belief in ultimate German victory 
on all fronts. Russia they considered was out 
of the war — if not permanently, at least for 
so long that her revivification would be value- 
less to the Entente. Germany was free there- 
fore, in the opinion of her leaders, to concen- 
trate on the western front and to pound her 
way through to victory. In such event, Belgium 
of course would never be restored to existence 
as a separate entity, but if it existed at all 
would either have hfe only as a German vassal 
or be loosened from the German grip, minus 
its coast line, its strategic frontier on the Meuse 
and the Sambre. The Pan-German party in- 
deed — decrying the 1914 statement of Beth- 
mann-Hollweg, the German Chancellor, that 
the invasion was a crime against international 
law for which compensation must be given 
after the war — was clamoring for the annexa- 
tion of the entire occupied portion of the 
state. 

The German view of the Belgian situation 
was, then, that the state would be freed, 
stripped of its coal, its iron, and its sea coast. 
This being the German belief, there was no 



Despoliation of Belgium 45 

reason why it should be despoiled by Germany 
and every reason why it should be preserved. 

But in June 1916 Germany received a 
terrific shock. Russia had come back to her 
own. The German victory of the year before 
had not been as complete or as devastating 
as the Germans had calculated upon. BrusilofF's 
great offensive had torn great gaps in the 
Austrian lines, laid bare the flanks, and threat- 
ened to tear loose the German grip on Courland 
and Poland, and throw all Teutonic armies 
back behind the Bug or the Vistula. Although 
in the midst of the great battle of Verdun, 
Germany had to fill in these gaps in the Austrian 
line to save the situation. But hardly had 
she made the first move when she was startled 
by the booming of the artillery fire which 
opened the battle of the Somme on the ist 
of July. Although checked at Verdun, Ger- 
many still had faith in her ultimate success. 
She still believed in the indestructible integrity 
of her western lines. 

She was soon to be undeceived. The battle 
of the Somme was hardly a month old, when 
the Allied artillery had pounded into the Ger- 
man consciousness that, after all, there was to 



46 German Plans for the Next War 

be no German victory in the west. On the 
contrary, so completely were their mental pro- 
cesses inverted as a result of the steady creep 
forward of the French and British lines, that 
the controlHng thought was not of victory but 
of how to avert defeat. For the first time 
Germany reaHzed that no peace was probable 
which did not provide for an independent, 
reconstituted and indemnified Belgium. 

The German tactics in Belgium were im- 
mediately changed. Then began the process 
of complete economic and social destruction. 
The first concrete evidence of Germany's 
intentions took the form of the deportation of 
the men of Belgium into Germany — the enslav- 
ing of the male population. Germany, of course, 
wove the usual network of lies in extenuation 
of this, the grossest crime of the war, just as 
soon as the protests from all civilized humanity 
began to pour in; her claim being that only 
the idle were deported. This was in a sense 
true, but why were there so many idlers, how 
did they become idle? 

Baron Adolph von Bachofen, a German 
official who visited the occupied territory in 
the very early summer of 191 6, wrote most 



Despoliation of Belgium 47 

enthusiastically of the work of the German 
Civil administration in reviving industrial and 
agricultural activity. As to agriculture, he 
stated then that "the supply of live stock is 
now again at its former height and the agri- 
cultural output is scarcely less than at any 
time before the conquest." 

Consequently, previous to October 3, 1916, 
the date of the first deportation order, there 
could have been no idleness among the agri- 
cultural workers. In fact, because of the 
absence in the army of so many of those who 
normally worked on the farms, heavy drafts 
must have been made on factory workers in 
order to keep up the agricultural output to 
what it was "before the conquest." Conse- 
quently, the number of factory workers who 
might have been idle was necessarily reduced. 
But, if we may accept the word of this German 
official investigator, over 70 per cent, of the 
coal mines were in operation and the percen- 
tage was constantly increasing; practically 
all of the iron mines and steel works; the 
pottery workers; even the diamond cutters — 
all these, together with most of the other 
industries, were approaching normal. There 



48 German Plans for the Next War 

could have been no great increase in the number 
of unemployed over that which had existed 
during the preceding two years. Moreover, 
we have the evidence I have just quoted that 
this number, due to the wisdom of German 
administration, was steadily decreasing. There- 
fore if there was an abnormal number of idle 
Belgian men, it must have been because the 
Germans themselves dehberately created such 
a condition. 

As a matter of fact this is exactly what 
happened. The German commanders stripped 
the Belgian factories of all machinery, threw 
out of employment all of the workers, and then 
under plea of idleness deported them. This 
is well known to any of the Americans who 
served with and under Herbert Hoover on 
the Belgian Relief Commission, to Brand 
Whitlock, the American Ambassador, to any 
of a hundred other Americans of established 
reputation. 

We can see then why the Germans picked, 
as the scenes for the first raids, Courtrai, Alost, 
Termonde, Bruges, Ghent, and Mons, as was 
claimed in the Belgian Government's protest 
to neutral powers against the forcible deporta- 



Despoliation of Belgium 49 

tlon of civilians. Courtral, Bruges, and Ghent 
were, before the war, the centers of the textile 
industry. Bruges also contained woolen mills 
and lace factories; Ghent, many lead and shot 
factories, gold and silver workers. Mons was 
one of the centers of metal working. Thus 
there is seen to be a close relation between 
Belgian industry and the points selected from 
which to steal and deport Belgian men. 

Now let us see what happened to this Industry 
as admitted by Germany and as charged by 
the Belgian Government. The note from the 
latter on this subject cites the following passages 
from a semi-official note that appeared in the 
Norddeutsche Allegemeine Zeitung, No. 392, of 
December 18, 1917, in which we find an admis- 
sion of the truth of the statements made in 
regard to dismantling the German factories. 

"All measures taken In Belgium are Inspired 
by military necessity. 

"The exploitation, under military control, of 
Belgian factories In order to repair locomotives 
and automobiles,* and also to obtain material of 
war for the front, Is carried out for the purpose of 
relieving the strain on German Industry and econ- 
omizing transportation. It has become necessary 
to strip the Belgian factories of their machinery 



50 German Plans for the Next War 

and other fittings, because all German industry 
is busy filling orders for material of war. . . . 
By relieving the home market from the necessity 
of enlarging our own factories we are accelerating 
the production of munitions and other products. 
... In consequence of the intense activity of all 
German industry, our machinery and other equip- 
ment is tremendously overworked, and must from 
time to time be partly replaced by new machines, 
while, furthermore, we must be able to furnish 
spare parts rapidly unless we wish to see our output 
of munitions diminish. The machinery and equip- 
ment required for these purposes are evidently 
brought from Belgian factories. The destruction 
of whole factories for the production of grapeshot 
is effected in order to maintain at its present level 
the supply of iron and steel in Germany or, if 
possible, to raise it. . . . It is not only possible, 
but even evident, that, in view of all the steps taken 
by the military authorities, the question of keeping 
up work in some of the factories of the occupied 
country must be subordinated to considerations 
tending to spare the lives of German soldiers and 
thus protect our national power." 

In latter days, Germany did not go through 
the formality of stripping the factories first 
and then of deporting the men thus thrown 
idle. In many cases she has deported the men 
first, as a means of destroying the Belgian 



Despoliation of Belgium 51 

commercial system, and then, as the factories 
were idle, Belgium of course had no use for 
them, so they were either stripped or turned 
over to German interests. 

On this general subject, there was received 
in the United States in the middle of February 
1918, an official Belgian document from which 
the following extracts are taken. 

First we see the working of the usual German 
method — a plea first in denial, then of justifi- 
cation and excuse. The Belgian note first 
quotes from the Nieuwe Rotter dmnsche Courant 
of December 27, 191 7, the following telegram, 
dated Berlin, the same day: 

"Reuter is sending out the assertion that the 
Germans are pillaging and demolishing the Belgian 
factories in order to hamper Belgian commerce 
after the war. On the contrary, Germany has 
already, merely in her own interest, done every- 
thing she could to restore to life the paralyzed 
industry of Belgium. If she has only partly suc- 
ceeded, the blame rests entirely on England, which 
has obstinately opposed every arrangement to 
supply the Belgian factories with raw material." 

To read such a statement in connection with 
that from the Norddeutsche Allegemeine Zeitung 



52 German Plans for the Next War 

of December i8th, issued only ten days before, 
and which I have previously quoted, not only fills 
one with contempt but with a feeling of pity 
for a nation which has sunk so low that it 
must defend its every act with a fabrication of 
lies which are so numerous and so frequent that 
they do not possess even the merit of con- 
sistency. 

To this statement the Belgian Government 
has issued a reply the essence of which is true 
and which the Americans, whose names I 
have mentioned and who have had every means 
of ascertaining the truth on the ground, have 
already pubhcly stated to be the facts. 

"Germany is trying in vain to throw upon others 
the responsibility for the ruin of Belgian industry. 
She is condemned by the facts and by her own 
admissions. 

"Germany is the immediate author of the cessa- 
tion of industry in Belgium. In 1914 and 1915 she 
seized all the existing stock of raw material. 

"It is strictly her fault that the importation of 
raw material could not be arranged for. In August 
and September 1915 there was submitted to the 
British Government, and accepted by it, a plan 
for organizing the supply of raw material to the 
industries of Belgium, under international guar- 



Despoliation of Belgium 53 

antees analogous to those which protect the supply 
of food. To save the industries of Belgium it re- 
mained only to obtain Germany's consent. But 
she turned a deaf ear, and the project naturally 
had no result. The British Government, in a letter 
published through the newspapers, officially declared 
Germany responsible." 

The Belgian report then goes on to relate the 
various steps Germany has taken to cripple 
Belgian industries. 

"The German authorities then aggravated the 
evils of industrial stoppage by forbidding public 
works and commandeering the factories and metals 
and leather for military purposes. After this they 
instituted the barbarous system of deporting work- 
men to perform forced labor in Germany, a system 
which they had to interrupt officially, after some 
months, because it proved revolting to the con- 
science of mankind, but only to substitute for it 
immediately the forced labor of the civilian popu- 
lation, in work of military value, by order of 
the military authorities. This system is still 
being cruelly maintained in the zones lying back 
of the fighting line in the provinces of East and 
West Flanders, Hainaut, Namur, and Luxemburg. 

"Meanwhile, the commandeering has become 
general, and affects both natural and manufactured 
products and also tools, motors, and means of 
transportation, whether mechanical or animal. 



54 German Plans for the Next War 

Finally, fiscal and administrative measures have 
been taken to close the last remaining outlets for 
Belgian products into neutral countries. 

"These facts are incontestable. They are proved 
by many rules and regulations officially published 
by the German authorities." 

Referring specifically to the stripping of the 
Belgian factories of machinery, and the trans- 
portation of this machinery into Germany, 
this official note states: 

"At present the raid upon the last economic 
resources of occupied Belgium has been carried on 
to such an extent that they are methodically taking 
away all the machinery from the factories, which 
they themselves have made idle, in some cases to 
set it up again in Germany, in other cases to break 
it up and use it for grapeshot. 

"The purpose of this entire system of destruction 
is double: First, to supply deficiencies in German 
industry; second, to put an end to Belgian com- 
petition and later to subject Belgian industry to 
that of German when the time comes for refitting 
the factories with machinery after the war. 

"The proofs collected by the Belgian Government 
in support of this statement are conclusive. 

"It is significant that in general the task of 
systematically stripping Belgian factories was en- 
trusted to German manufacturers, who were the 



Despoliation of Belgium 55 

direct competitors of the Belgian owners. Some 
of them have taken advantage of their official 
positions to steal secrets of manufacturing pro- 
cesses — for example, at the artificial silk shops of 
Obourg — and personal methods of production and 
sale. 

"Moreover, some of these authorized pillagers 
have let fall admissions, v/hich have been repro- 
duced in the German press and which leave no 
room for doubt. These admissions are strung along 
throughout the years 1915 to 1917; they agree 
with one another, and have become more and more 
precise as the war has gone on." 

This question of the destruction of Belgian 
industries, particularly since the early fall of 
1916, has been dealt with at considerable 
length because it is one of the most important 
elements of the German scheme. It emphasizes 
the transition from the second to the third 
phase of the Belgian occupation, and the 
change of the German attitude toward Belgium 
incident to that transition. As long as Ger- 
many thought that she was to remain in pos- 
session of Belgium, her policy was generally 
constructive; when, however, she realized that 
her scheme was to be frustrated, she deliberately 
set out to obliterate Belgium from Europe. 



56 German Plans for the Next War 

The net results which have been accomplished 
through this process are: 

First: the impoverishing of the country 
through outrageous levies of money. 

Second: the economic ruin brought about 
through stripping all factories of their ma- 
chinery. 

Third: the social and commercial destruction 
produced through the deportation of the able- 
bodied male element in the population. 

In brief, Belgium is but a shell. Its factories 
are but walls; its population composed for the 
most part only of women, children, and old 
men; its past commercial structure in ruins. 
Economic dependence is absolute and it is 
the German intention that it remain so. 

Before linking up this outline of the German 
processes in Belgium with the German plan 
for a future war, we may first examine the 
situation in northeastern France and compare 
the German actions here with those in Belgium. 
In the early days of the German invasion of 
France there was an apparent regard for the 
laws of war, and no organized destruction. 
Indeed, for the short period during which the 
Germans occupied Rheims, they paid the 



Despoliation of Belgium 57 

French in gold, and at a very good price, for 
all the wine they drank. 

But this period was short. Once the battle 
lines became established, occupied France was 




THE DESTRUCTION OF BELGIUM 
The areas in which the Germans have destroyed cities and towns 
m this thickly populated industrial country. Everywhere they 
have stripped industry of its machinery and deported labor in an 
effort to keep Belgium from becoming an economic competitor 
after the war. The size of the dots on the map indicates the num- 
ber of buildings destroyed. The largest (Ypres), 3700 buildings 
destroyed; the smallest (Poulseur), 25 (or less) buildings destroyed 

governed very much as was Belgium in the 
second phase of occupation. But again the 
battle of the Somme intervened and Germany 
learned that she was not to be permitted to 



58 German Plans for the Next War 

hold in the west any of the gains she had so 
foully acquired. Threatened, as a result of 
the Somme fighting, with serious disaster, she 
prepared for retreat to a new line. 

The wave of horror which swept over the 
world when the nature of this retreat became 
known, will keep its memory alive at least 
until those who read of it have gone. The 
whole countryside was literally leveled to the 
ground. Orchards were destroyed, every tree 
sawed off close to the roots, every farmhouse 
with its outbuildings burned, every garden and 
every bush uprooted. Every work of art and of 
architecture was leveled, all Nature was sys- 
tematically ravished until all that remained 
of a populous thriving country were the earth 
and the sky. 

The tearing up of earth roads, the dynamit- 
ing of bridges and railroads, these are all cal- 
culated to delay an advancing army and, 
consequently, are reasonable, if regrettable, 
precautions for an army in retreat to take. 
But for that orgy of rapacious, vicious devas- 
tation there seemed no logical reason or excuse. 
The popular idea at the time was that all this 
was but the outcropping of the same spirit 



Despoliation of Belgium 59 

that manifested itself in Belgium; that it was 
but evidence of an innate lust for destruction, 
of a pure vandalistic tendency. 

This might hold true were the acts but the 
acts of individuals. But they were not. The 
whole idea was carried out in the prosecution 
of a carefully considered, thoroughly organized, 
plan. It was dictated neither by an instinct 
for destruction nor through impulse. Germany 
does not work that way. She is cunning, 
shrewdly calculating, materialistic. Her leaders 
could not but realize that these acts of rapacity 
— more like the venting of rage of some savage 
beast than like the acts of a civilized, organized, 
state — were calculated to arouse among her 
enemies a feeling of bitter resentment and 
hatred that would completely close the door 
to a generous peace in case of a defeat; and 
defeat, be it noted, actually threatened. To 
assume that such deeds were done wantonly, 
without thought and without motive, is to 
charge Germany with a thoughtlessness, a 
carelessness, entirely at variance with our 
knowledge of her character. There must there- 
fore have been a clearly defined and well under- 
stood motive. 



6o German Plans for the Next War 

Since, as has been proven, Germany has for 
generations been casting a covetous eye west- 
ward and has expressed the desire if not the in- 
tention ultimately to annex the most important 
territory of her western neighbors, let us assume 
that she, realizing that in this war she was 
doomed to defeat in the west, had in mind the 
launching of another war later, in order to 
realize the ambitions still ungratified in this 
quarter. With this assumption as a basis, then, 
let us see how it fits in with the situation which 
Germany has created in France and Belgium. 

Germany, at the beginning of such a war, 
will be confronted with the same military 
problem which confronted her in 1914. From 
Luxemburg to the Swiss frontier she will be 
faced first with the fortified area of Verdun, 
guarded from an eastern attack by the Heights 
of the Woevre; by the barrier of the Moselle 
with Nancy as the defensive center, and finally 
with the Vosges Mountains, passage of which 
can be forced only through the gaps at Epinal 
and Belfort, the western exits of which are 
thoroughly guarded. It is an easy line to 
defend, a most difficult one to attack. 

Would Germany strike here, submitting to 



Despoliation of Belgium 6i 

an indefinite delay, or would she come down 
from the northeast, ignoring again the neu- 
trality of Belgium in order to strike France 
along an unprotected frontier? With the 
accumulated knowledge of the last three years, 
an answer is superfluous. Having flaunted the 
opinion of the civilized world in 1914 we may 
be certain she would do the same thing again 
should it serve her interests. No thinking 
man, then, will take issue with the assertion 
that, should Germany strike again at France, 
her army will advance along the line of least 
resistance, no matter what violations of neutral 
territory may be involved in the process. 

Striking down through Belgium, what opposi- 
tion would she meet between the German 
frontier and Paris? It has been shown how 
thoroughly Belgium has been destroyed. It 
was the German plan to have it done so as to 
defy any immediate reconstruction. Every 
district, every factory in that district, with 
its machinery equipment, must be built up 
anew. Moreover, Belgium would not have the 
man power to hold in check even a fragment 
of the German army. With northeastern 
France, the situation would be the same. Of 



62 German Plans for the Next War 

all this great industrial region, there would not 
remain a vestige nor an obstacle. All would 
be leveled, coal and iron mines destroyed, 
farms ruined, commercial structures blasted. 
It would take France indeed just as long to 
recover as it will Belgium. In much less time 
would Germany be ready, and with Belgium 
no longer a thorn in her side, and with the 
northeastern gateway to France wide open, 
the German hordes could march, without 
effective opposition, to Paris and Calais. 

It is a repetition of an old German idea. 
Julius Caesar wrote of the German tribes as 
follows : 

"The tribes deem it an honorable distinction to 
have their frontiers devastated, to be surrounded 
with immense deserts. They regard it as the highest 
proof of valor for their neighbors to abandon their 
territories out of fear of them; moreover, they have 
thus an additional security against sudden attack," 



CHAPTER IV 

CALAIS-BAGDAD NOT HAMBURG-BAGDAD 

THE GERMAN AIM 

When General Moritz von Bissing died he 
left among his papers an extraordinary docu- 
ment which bears out most positively the 
conclusions reached in the previous chapter. 
General von Bissing was the Governor-General 
of conquered Belgium from 191 5 to 1917, so 
that this document has a peculiar interest in 
connection with Germany's future plans. 

After discussing the present war in a general 
way, he states: 

"I shall now indicate the strategic importance 
of Belgium for a future war. In order to be able 
to conduct the present war offensively at all, the 
German Supreme Command was forced to march 
through Belgium, and in this process the right wing 
of the German army had to push itself laboriously 
along the edge of the Dutch province of Limburg. 
Strategically, the objective of the present war, as 
regards the western theater, should consist in our 

63 



64 German Plans for the Next War 

obtaining elbow room, in order that in any new 
war whatever we should be able to operate with 
our army against France and England. If the 
result of the present war were the continued exist- 
ence of an independent Belgian State, the operations 
would have to be conducted differently and under 
greater difficulties than at the beginning of the 
present war; for the aim of France and England 
will be, in conjunction with an allied or strongly 
influenced Belgium, to anticipate the German 
army. It will, therefore, rightly be asked whether 
in such circumstances it can be possible to guarantee 
the freedom of operations of the German right 
wing, and whether the advance of these groups 
of armies to conduct a new war offensively is 
possible." 

There is in this quotation first a direct 
reference to another war, showing the trend 
of German thought even in the midst of the 
present horrors. A little later he indicates that 
this projected war is to be against England and 
France, proving that there is at least the fear 
that in the present war these nations cannot 
be worsted. Finally, there is the strategic 
relation of Belgium to this future war which 
makes it necessary for the success of German 
arms that Belgium be removed as a possible 
enemy by the simple process of annexation. 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 65 

Somewhat later he discusses the value of 
industrial Belgium to Germany, and, it will 
be noted, candidly admits the removal of 
Belgian machinery to Germany. 

"The advantages which we have been able 
during the present war to obtain from Belgian 
industry by the removal of machinery and so on, 
are as important as the disadvantages which our 
enemies have suffered through lack of this addition 
to their fighting strength. 

"When one considers the importance of Belgium 
as the theater of our armies' advance and as terri- 
tory which favors our further operations, both 
offensively and defensively, there can be no further 
doubt that a frontier which is quite falsely de- 
scribed as the line of the Meuse and is to be pro- 
tected by the fortresses of Liege and Namur, is 
inadequate. No, our frontier — in the interest also of 
our sea power — must be pushed forward to the sea. 
. . . The annual Belgian production of 23,000,000 
tons of coal has given us a monopoly on the continent 
which has helped to maintain our vitality. In 
addition to these factors which are of importance 
in a new war, the protection of our economic inter- 
ests in Belgium, even in time of peace, is of inestima- 
ble importance." 

This statement is remarkable for the com- 
plete lack of moral sense exhibited. There is not 



66 German Plans for the Next War 

a thought given to any rights that Belgium 
may have; it is the doctrine of the righteous- 
ness of brute force. Anything which will add 
to German strength, Germany is free to take, 
no matter to whom it may happen to belong. 
As regards the extension of German colonial 
possessions, we find a most ambitious program. 

"The Belgian Congo is certainly to be aimed at, 
and I desire to insist that a German colonial empire, 
whatever its shape, is indispensable for Germany's 
world policy and expansion of power." 

It is not known exactly when this "political 
testament" was penned, but it was either in 
the latter part of 191 5 or in the early months of 
1916, before the Russian offensive in June or 
the battle of the Somme in July. In fact this 
document contains a reference to "a peace 
concluded in 1916" showing that this is the 
case. Therefore, while Von Bissing realized 
the possibility of defeat, the possibility was so 
remote that he did not give it serious thought. 
The entire document emphasizes the impor- 
tance of Belgium to Germany as a ground on 
which to prepare for another crushing blow 
at England and France. Had Von Bissing, 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 6"] 

holding the views that have been quoted, 
written six months later, would he not have 
advocated just such a policy as that which has 
been carried out in both Belgium and France, 
so that in the next w^ar they may be able to 
interpose no obstacles between the German 
army and the French coast? Would he not, 
in defeat, have prepared the way for a subse- 
quent victory? 

Several objections may be raised to the 
theory that Germany is thinking of another 
war. The first is that of money. In the first 
place, money is not essential to war. As long 
as a nation is self-supporting and is not com- 
pelled to go out into neutral markets for raw 
materials, foreign credit is not necessary. All 
that is needed, as Germany has proven, is a 
printing press and the power to assert that the 
products of that press shall be the medium of 
exchange and a hope of victory. If victory 
is achieved, its fruits will solve the question of 
foreign credit. 

But aside from her credit in foreign countries 
Germany is wealthier to-day by billions than 
she was when the war began. She has robbed 
and looted and pillaged wherever she has set 



68 German Plans for the Next War 

foot; through Belgian and French coal and 
iron she has waged war at not more than 50 
per cent, of the cost to the AlHes who must 
transport their supply of these essentials three 
thousand miles overseas; she has annexed 
thousands of square miles of new and produc- 
tive territory and is rapidly exploiting it with 
enslaved labor to which she pays practically 
nothing in wages. If allowed to hold her 
Eastern accessions, she could give up all of 
France and Belgium, pay them both sub- 
stantial indemnities, and still find the war the 
most profitable enterprise of that sort she has 
ever provoked. 

But Germany has also been making money 
in other ways — profiteering at the expense of 
her Allies. Neither Austria, Bulgaria, nor 
Turkey contains coal or iron in any material 
quantities — certainly not in sufficient quanti- 
ties to supply the demand. While it is true 
that none of the three has been forced to use 
artillery on a scale even approximating that 
of Germany, Austria has still had to supply a 
great demand on account of the battles against 
Russia and Italy; Bulgaria because of the 
fighting first against Serbia and now on the 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 69 

Saloniki front, Turkey because of the fighting 
in Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Palestine. Prac- 
tically all of the raw material consumed in 
these areas was purchased from Germany, 
and, we may depend upon it, at an exorbitant 
price; and where did Germany get it? 

Germany stole it — coal and iron from Bel- 
gium, coal and iron from France, iron from 
Longwy and Briey, coal from Lens. The 
mining was done by forced labor from Belgium 
and France, prisoners from Russia. The cost 
to Germany was practically nothing. How 
many hundreds of millions were obtained in 
this manner only Germany knows — more, cer- 
tainly, than could be paid for except through 
loans — through bonds. Germany, therefore, 
has an economic grip on her allies which only 
defeat can break — a grip which has throttled 
them into abject bondage. 

Germany too, it must be remembered, has not 
yet been touched by the war. Only in East 
Prussia, which is almost entirely agricultural, 
has the war reached German soil. Westphalia, 
Rhineland, Saar, the great industrial districts 
of western Germany, are more keenly alive 
commercially than in 1914- With her own 



yo German Plans for the Next War 

wealth but slightly dissipated and with this 
dissipation more than counterbalanced by in- 
creased assets obtained through conquest, with 
her industries all working at the very top of 
their stride, Germany's recovery will be most 
rapid. Certainly, unless some measures are 
taken to prevent it, she can be ready again for 
war very rapidly. 

A final objection to this idea of a future 
war rests on the question of man power. 
Germany has lost heavily in men; will continue 
to lose heavily during the rest of the war. Her 
loss in killed alone will, before the day of peace, 
fall but little short of two million men. For 
such a war as Germany is planning, her mili- 
tary force must possess overwhelming numbers 
in order to carry the plan through in permissible 
time. Where will Germany, who has suffered 
so heavily in loss of man power, obtain suf- 
ficient men to insure victory in the new battle 
of Europe? 

This question, too, Germany has carefully 
considered. Indeed it was the most pressing 
element which led to the subjection by Ger- 
many of her allies to the degree of vassalage 
they are now suffering from. Germany wanted 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 71 

control of their man power as well as of their 
resources and their trade routes. She cannot be 
refused now that she holds in her hands their 
economic fate. The relation of Turkey to 
Germany is notorious. The Turks are a con- 
quered people — conquered in soul and in body 
by the tyranny of the Kaiser. They have no 
independence of plan or of thought. They are 
slaves. In Turkey there is a population of 
about twenty million — undisciplined, unorgan- 
ized, unequipped — but innately possessed of 
good fighting abihty. From this force Ger- 
many can, in one generation, produce a trained, 
organized army of at least two million men. 
To this number Bulgaria will add half a million 
more, bringing the number of German-trained 
soldiers East of Serbia to two and a half million. 
But these forces must be brought into play 
west of Belgrade, and to effect this Germany 
must control the Oriental Railroad. This 
will explain Germany's actions in Serbia. 
Serbia is the bridge which spans the gap 
between Germany and her Near Eastern allies. 
Through Serbia and Serbia alone can the Ger- 
man dream of a Hamburg-Bagdad railroad 
become a reality. If peace were declared and 



72 German Plans for the Next War 

there were decreed a reconstruction of the 
Serbian state, there would always exist a 
constant threat against that all-important link 
between Belgrade and Nish. Germany can 
reap the maximum benefits from the Oriental 
Railroad only through holding in a tutelage 
which approaches bondage all of the lands 
through which that railroad passes. Only by 
this means can Germany develop the full 
resources of the Near East, organize the Turk- 
ish population into an effective military force, 
and mobilize it in Europe for a war against 
England and France. 

Since Germany cannot unite the Serbs to 
herself by treaty, and since it was necessary 
to get Serbia out of the way, Germany delib- 
erately planned to reduce her to a state of 
complete innocuousness from which she could 
not recover in a half century, if ever. We 
therefore witnessed in the fall and winter of 
191 5, the complete immolation of Serbia on the 
altar of German ambition. Of the four and a 
half milhon of people, about one and a half 
are dead, one million are in exile or in the 
army, the others deported into Austria and 
Bulgaria and undergoing a system of unscru- 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 73 



pulous annihilation. The country itself has 
been turned into a desert waste; women have 
been deliberately left to starve and freeze in 



@ X^(3)AUSTRIA' 

\-\ r-. ^ .'• "'V 'V'. v" Vienna 

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V V,. ' Lerabere" **» 




GEOGRAPHY OF SERBIAN EXILE 

The distances that Serbian exiles are sent preclude the possibility 
of their easy return after the war 

the mountains with their babies on their 
breasts. Children on whose small shoulders 
rests the future strength of the state, have 
been viciously, deliberately murdered. Not one 
generation must pass but probably two, before 
Serbia can rise from the ashes; but by that 



74 German Plans for the Next War 

time, in the German plan, it will be too late; 
the Oriental road will have been open long 
enough to have permitted the Turks and 
Bulgars to fight in France, the next war will 
have been fought and won. 

We therefore have, so far, an open route 
by which three and a quarter million of German 
slaves can enter Western Europe. In Greece 
of course, due to ties of kinship and autocracy 
between the rulers, there is already a strong 
pro-German party, which, should Germany 
obtain a Teutonic peace, will seize the reins 
and again turn Greece over to the Kaiser. 
Thus another half million soldiers are added 
to the army of German minions. Of Rumania, 
Germany is frankly dubious. King Ferdinand 
has spoiled her plans more than once, and in 
spite of the fact that he is a Hohenzollern, 
bends distinctly to the racial tie which binds the 
Rumanian people to the other races using the 
Romance languages. Therefore, in order to place 
this state also within his grasp, it is ordained 
that, in return for peace, the Rumanians must 
force Ferdinand to abdicate in favor of his 
brother. But who is this brother? Prince 
William of Hohenzollern, a General of Prussian 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 75 

infantry. Thus we have the Balkan chain 
complete, with every link of it perfectly welded 
on a German anvil to the German throne. 
Of Austria little need be added to what has 
already been said. As things are now, she is 
a slave, dominated in every way by her Teu- 
tonic master. Her fifty-two million population 
is Germany's to do with as Germany elects. 
There is no voice in the empire powerful enough 
to combat the German Kaiser's. 

Now, let us turn westward, and look into 
the measures which Germany has adopted for 
herself to close the gaps which the war has torn 
in her man power. The German plans to in- 
crease her man power have taken several forms. 

First, there was the authorized and syste- 
matic ravishing of the women of France and 
Belgium and the sending of the offspring from 
this official and bestial debauchery into Ger- 
many, to be reared in German institutions — 
to form a part of the future defense. Of this 
fact there is no longer any doubt. It has been 
definitely and clearly established by unim- 
peachable neutral testimony. 

The deportation of the men of Belgium is 
another phase. These men will, of course, 



76 German Plans for the Next War 

never return to their homes if Germany can 
prevent it, and so in themselves will constitute 
an effective increase in the male population. 
But they will do more than this. Either vol- 
untarily or through compulsion, they will 
form some sort of liaison, legitimate or other- 
wise, with the surplus women of Germany and 
will beget offspring which in twenty years will 
be available food for powder. As the excess of 
Germany's female population in 1914 was 
800,000 and is now three times that number, 
this will prove a ready means of taking care 
of some of the surplus. 

Another means of providing for a new and 
increased population is what is termed the 
lateral marriages. There are hundreds of 
thousands of young women in Germany, capable 
of bearing children, who are at present not so 
engaged either because unmarried or because of 
the absence of their husbands at the front. To 
German efficiency this is a waste of human 
material. God would not have endowed woman 
with this important function were it not in- 
tended that it should be used as frequently as 
the laws of nature permit. And to what better 
use could it be put than for the Fatherland? 



Calais- Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 77 

Germany therefore proposes a "lateral" mar- 
riage. The general plan is outlined in the fol- 
lowing quotation taken from a pamphlet 
published in Cologne, entitled: "The Secondary 
Marriage as only Means for the Rapid Creation 
of a New and Powerful Army and the Purifica- 
tion of Morality": 

"Women in all classes of society who have reached 
a certain age are, in the interests of the Fatherland, 
not only authorized but called upon to enter into a 
secondary marriage, which is supported by personal 
inclination. Only a married man may be the object 
of this inclination, and he must have the consent 
of his married wife. This condition is necessary 
in order to prevent the mischief which otherwise 
might surely be expected. 

"The offspring of these lawful secondary mar- 
riages bear the name of their mother, and are handed 
over to the care of the State, unless the mother 
assumes responsibility for them. They are to be 
regarded in every respect as fully equal members 
of society. The mothers wear a narrow wedding 
ring as a sign of their patriotism. The secondary 
marriage can be dissolved as soon as its object 
has been attained." 

But, you may say, anyone may write and 
distribute a pamphlet, even though it may 
have an immoral purpose. True enough. 



78 German Plans for the Next War 

But the following is quoted from a leaflet, 
widely circulated among the soldiers at the 
front, not over the objection but with the 
consent and active cooperation of the officers: 

"Soldiers, a grave danger assails the Fatherland 
by reason of the dwindling birth rate. The cradles 
of Germany are empty to-day; it is your duty to 
see that they are filled. 

"You bachelors, when your leave comes, marry 
at once the girl of your choice. Make her your 
wife without delay. 

"The Fatherland needs healthy children. 

"You married men and your wives should put 
jealousy from your minds and consider whether 
you have not also a duty to the Fatherland. 

"You should consider whether you may not 
honorably contract an alliance with one of the 
million of bachelor women. See if your wife will 
not sanction the relation. 

"Remember, all of you, the empty cradles of 
Germany must be filled." 

Here is a direct invitation to the individual 
issued to him with the sanction of the State, 
to disregard the sanctity of his marriage vows 
and to contract just such an alliance as the 
pamphleteer who was first quoted has ad-, 
vocated. 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 79 

And if this be not enough, copies of the fol- 
lowing circular letter have been found on a 
number of German prisoners captured by the 
British during the last two years: 

"On account of all able-bodied men having been 
called to the colors, it remains the duty of all 
those left behind, for the sake of the Fatherland, 
to interest themselves in the happiness and health 
of the married women and maidens, by doubling 
or even trebling the births. 

"Your name has been given us as a capable man, 
and you are herewith requested to take on this office 
of honor, and to do your duty in a proper German 
way. It must here be pointed out that your wife 
or fiancee will not be able to claim a divorce; it is 
in fact hoped that the women will bear this discom- 
fort heroically for the sake of the war. You will 

be given the district of . Should you not 

feel capable of carrying on the task allotted to you, 
you will be given three days in which to name some 
one in your place. On the other hand, if you are 
prepared to take on a second district as well, you 
will become *vrek offizier' and receive a pension. 

"An exhibition of photographs of women and 
maidens in the district allotted to you is to be seen 

at the office of . You are requested to bring 

this letter with you. Your good work should begin 
immediately. A full report of results to be sub- 
mitted by you after nine months." 



8o German Plans for the Next War 

Proof, too, that these instructions are being 
carried out is abundant. We may disregard, 
if we are so incHned, the testimony of returned 
travelers. We cannot ignore the fact that the 
number of illegitimate births during 1917 
showed an increase of 25 per cent, over 1916; 
and that a high German authority found it 
necessary to defend the statistics on the ground 
that it proved the fundamental morality of the 
German people — they were not practising birth 
control. 

The next development concerned the women 
who have been widowed through the war and 
the men who have been so crippled as to be of 
no further use in the war area. The burgo- 
masters of the various German towns have 
been instructed to obtain a list of all war 
widows in the districts presided over by them, 
a list of all cripples being furnished by the 
authorities. Advertisements are then to be 
placed in papers known to be read by women 
generally, for wives for the deserving cripples. 
Thus, playing the role of Cupid, the beneficent 
Government will bring together Venus and 
Adonis and, as is stated in official instructions, 
sow the seed of a new generation which will, in 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 8i 

the fullness of its manhood, take upon its 
shoulders the national defense. 

Finally, in the discussion of population, we 
come to Germany's purpose in Africa. In 
November 1917, the semi-official Cologne Ga- 
zette announced that Germany, in addition to 
recovering her own African colonies, must take 
over those of Great Britain, France, Belgium, 
and Portugal. This was not mere braggadocio. 
It was put out in all seriousness as a means of 
meeting Germany's most crying need. The 
Colonial troops, this paper argues, have proven 
their value in the war in two ways: first, they 
have been a material addition to the forces in 
Europe and have given an excellent account of 
themselves on the battle field; second, they 
have been proven thoroughly competent to de- 
fend their own land against attacks from the 
outside and thus have guaranteed the title to 
their land in its present holders. If Germany 
had had a Colonial army five times the size of 
the one she possessed, the argument continues, 
the Allies would not have been able to bring 
their Colonial forces into Europe. Therefore, 
"Germany must have a strong Colonial army 
to strengthen her position and at the same time 



82 German Plans for the Next War 

weaken that of her enemies, who must never 
again be allowed to bring colored troops to 
their aid in Europe." This factor, however, 
need not be seriously considered. It is inter- 
jected here merely to show how present-day 
German thought is inclined. 

In concluding the discussion of Germany's 
available population for a future war, we must 
regard with anxious eyes the situation in 
Russia, unstable and kaleidoscopic as it is. 
Under the terms of the treaty which the Bolshe- 
viki made with Germany in February 191 8 
Germany has complete control of Poland, 
Courland, Lithuania and practically all of 
Livonia, which provinces contain, or did con- 
tain in 1914, a population of approximately 
twenty-five million men. Ukraine, nominally 
an independent governmental entity, is par- 
tially Germanized and the process now under 
way will be completed within the year. 
Ukraine also has a population of about the 
same volume, so that, through the Russian 
operations, Germany has acquired control of 
a population of fifty million, which popula- 
tion, unless the Entente succeed in amelio- 
rating Russia's situation, threatens to provide 



Calais-Bagdad Not Hamburg-Bagdad 83 

Germany with a large army for the next war 
against us. 

We may therefore sum up the situation as 
it will exist after the close of the present war 
according to the German plans — and as it will 
exist in fact, unless Germany is decisively 
beaten in the field. 

Germany, her territory unscathed by the 
present war, will rapidly recover from its 
effects, while her continental enemies, so bit- 
terly ravished by war's sweep, will lag far behind 
in the process of regeneration. Under these 
conditions the mobilization of her man power 
and that of her vassal allies will place an over- 
whelming army, all German trained and Ger- 
man equipped, under the German command, 
to be thrown against her weakened adversaries 
in Europe. This time, according to the Germans' 
plan, the struggle is to be short. There is to be 
no miscalculation, no Marne, no Verdun. 

Then the real German aim — not Hamburg- 
Bagdad but Calais-Bagdad — is to be achieved; 
and out of the present war will have sprung 
the World Power of which the Pan-German 
League has been dreaming since 1870 and of 
which Bernhardi wrote in 1912. 



CHAPTER V 

"world empire or downfall'* 

The developments in Russia have given to 
Germany's eastward expansion a greater im- 
portance than even the Pan-German writer 
or Chancellor Michaelis even hoped. No con- 
clusions as to the ultimate outcome of Russia's 
difficulties can be safely drawn; the Rus- 
sians present the uncertain element in the 
situation. But the cloud which obscures 
Russia's future from our view does not conceal 
Germany in its shadow. Germany's intention 
and her object stand out clear in the picture's 
foreground. 

To say that Germany is, in its dealings with 
Russia, indulging in an orgy of Pan-Germanism; 
that the extent of the Russian collapse intoxi- 
cated the German leaders and sent them reeling 
about Berlin, thoroughly drunk with dreams 
of power and conquest, is to state the truth 
in general terms. But details are needed to 

give the true picture. 

84 



"World Empire or Downfall'* 85 

When Finland, Ukraine and the Caucasus 
declared their independence and attempted 
to set up governments of their own, Germany 
not only encouraged but through skillful propa- 
ganda brought these results about. Germany's 
penchant for swallowing small states is well 
known even though her ability to digest them 
is narrow and limited — Russia has always been 
Germany's fear. The great numbers of the 
Russian people, the unlimited resources in 
food and raw materials of all kinds, the vast 
extent of her territory, have, in addition to 
exciting German cupidity, filled Germany with 
dread lest in some future day, this vast Russian 
wealth be mobilized for war and turned against 
the Teutonic powers. So, to avoid repetition, 
Germany first exerted her efforts toward a 
decentralization of Russian power through the 
simple expedient of dividing Russia into a 
number of small groups, none of which can 
have the power to resist. Then by Germanizing 
each group independently Germany hopes to 
keep the so-called independent states as German 
vassals. Therefore when Russia herself, and 
elements in Finland and Ukraine, resented the 
separation and took up arms against the new 



86 German Plans for the Next War 

governments, Germany rushed to their aid 
with a fanfare of trumpets and grandiloquent 
manifestoes of self-laudation for protecting 
against despotic aggression new states who 
desired to apply to themselves the principle 
of the right of peoples to determine their own 
government. But by this process of sending 
German troops into these states, Germany 
means to graft herself permanently onto their 
organization. She intends to take root with 
them and become a fixed part of them. 

In the case of Finland the eventual result at 
which Germany aims is the control of Scandi- 
navia and the conversion of the Baltic Sea into 
a German lake. If the German plans succeed 
Norway and Sweden will find it impossible to 
maintain more than a nominal independence. 
On land they could not face a victorious Ger- 
many and their safety at sea must depend on 
the British navy. In so far as their resources 
and raw materials are concerned, coercion will 
place them entirely at Germany's disposal when 
and as they may be required, unless the Allied 
armies break up this whole German scheme. 
This is a most important consideration in 
connection with a future war. Sweden has a 



"World Empire or Downfall" 87 

wealth of raw materials which in case of war 
Germany wishes to have available. The most 
important of these is a very high-grade iron 
ore of which Sweden produces annually about 
eight million tons. In the matter of food sup- 
plies, the net exports of cattle, pigs, and animal 
food — a product of which Germany has always 
need — aggregate annually about ninety million 
tons. 

Ukraine is of even greater importance, aside 
from the question of population which has 
already been referred to. The present war is 
largely a war for raw materials — Germany 
wants to be self-supporting; she wants to 
include within her boundaries, or have fastened 
to her by bonds which only she can loosen, 
territory capable of producing all materials 
needed for home consumption in both war and 
peace. In 1914 there was a serious shortage. 
German imports were heavy both of food- 
stuffs and other basic materials. At least in 
so far as food is concerned, Ukraine can fill 
the want. Although comprising but one- 
seventh of the Russian population, Ukraine 
produces one-third of all Russian grain, and one- 
half of all Russian livestock. The great wealth 



88 German Plans for the Next War 




RUSSIA AND THE RESOURCES GERMANY 
The two battle lines enclose the area occupied by German troops 
were being discussed. The important industrial centers of 
difficulty in delivering what supplies they may have to the Cen- 

Black Sea and the 



'World Empire or Downfall" 89 




MEANS TO ORGANIZE FOR HER OWN BENEFIT 
while various peace negotiations on the basis of no annexations 
Ukraine, although not served by many railroads, will have little 
tral Powers because of the excellent water route through the 
Danube River 



90 German Plans for the Next War 

of Russia's potential iron supply and 90 per 
cent, of Russia's coal supply also are found 
in Ukraine. In the next war, therefore, as the 
Germans plan it, Russia would be helpless with 
Ukraine in Germany's hands. 

Strategically Ukraine is of equal importance. 
Reference to a map of Russia will show Ukraine 
stretching eastward from Russian Poland, along 
the Black Sea to the western boundary of the 
Don Cossack country. Practically the full 
length of Ukraine is east of the new Russian 
border and is perpendicular to it. 
« The configuration of the Russian boundary, 
as created by the treaty of peace, is such that 
with Ukraine and Germany working together, 
the heart of Russia is placed between the jaws 
of a pincers with no possible defense against 
their closing; a rift in the defense either on the 
western or southern boundary line, and all of 
Russia west of the meridian of Moscow would 
automatically pass into German control. Under 
the German plan, the plan which Germany has 
already carried out unless it is overturned by 
outside interference, Russia, as a potential 
military obstacle to Germany's world dominion, 
will not exist. Russia will be a country which 



"World Empire or Downfall" 91 

will exist only through Teutonic sufferance; its 
population will be dependent upon Germany 
for the food it eats and the clothes it wears. 
It will be deprived of the ability to defend 
itself against attack, even to develop its own 
resources. There will be but one avenue left: 
a treaty of alliance with Germany — commercial 
and military — in order that its future life 
may be guaranteed. This is what Germany 
intends. The complete defeat of the Ger- 
man armies is the only thing that is sure to 
prevent it. 

In the Caucasus we are faced with an equal 
menace, while at the same time seeing, even 
more clearly, Germany's hand. The treaty 
which Germany finally forced upon Russia 
involved the cession to Turkey of Batoum, 
Kars and Ardahan. Batoum is the center of 
the Russian oil industry, which surpasses even 
that of the United States. It is nonsense to 
suppose that Germany did this out of regard 
for Turkey. In the first place Germany is not 
interested in the aggrandizement of Turkey 
unless in the process Germany be benefited. 
In the second place, the industrial life of 
Turkey makes no demand on oil, and has no 



92 German Plans for the Next War 

need whatever of the supply of Batoum which 
is the bulk of the entire output of Russia. 

What, then, was behind the apparent Ger- 
man gift to Turkey? The oil from Batoum 
can be carried over the Black Sea to the mouth 
of the Danube and thence up the river to Austria 
and Germany. With Germany in command 
of the Dardanelles, as she is now, the Black 
Sea becomes an inland waterway not subject in 
any way to outside interference and hence 
subject to Germany's exclusive use. Thus 
Germany herself can obtain directly from this 
Turkish addition, a supply of crude oil not 
only sufficient for peace demands but for war 
purposes as well. 

But there is more than this. If this cession 
of territory is permitted to stand, Germany 
has acquired a direct land route to India and 
the Far East — through Turkey to Persia and 
Afghanistan. Her desire for colonies will not 
let Germany stop at the Black Sea. Soon her 
hand will stretch out to the Pacific, the whole 
British Empire will be threatened; and, should 
Germany not endeavor to spread westward to 
South America and even Canada — which she 
will do — we must inevitably become involved 



"World Empire or Downfall" 93 

through the Philippine Islands — for remember 
the German plan is: world empire or downfall. 

There is one other important raw material 
which the Near East can and will furnish to 
Germany. This is cotton. The blockade of 
Germany which was established by England and 
is now perfected by the United States, threat- 
ened to bring an end to the war through 
cutting off the base material for making ex- 
plosive. This base material was cotton which 
furnished the cellulose content of gun-cotton. 
Germany anticipated the shortage in cotton, 
however, by making a wood-pulp substitute. 
This substitute serves the purpose but is not as 
reliable as cotton, a much higher percentage 
of German shells failing to explode than was 
the case when cotton was used. 

If Germany's plans carry through, such 
shortage will not occur a second time. Meso- 
potamia was, in ancient days, the world's 
greatest cotton belt. Bagdad was the world's 
cotton center. Under Turkish rule, however, 
the agricultural value of Mesopotamia sank 
rapidly and finally dwindled to insignificant 
proportions. To-day, indeed, Mesopotamia 
is practically a desert uninhabited except along 



94 German Plans for the Next War 

its natural watercourses. The conditions which 
made this country wealthy and populous can 
be readily restored. It is almost entirely a 
question of irrigation and organization and 
both of these the genius ofGermany can supply. 
Long before the children which Germany is 
making every effort to have brought into the 
world, by the means which have been described, 
reach the age when they will be able to bear 
arms, Mesopotamia can be brought back to 
its former state of productiveness and can 
furnish Germany with all the cotton she may 
need for the prosecution of war. 

In Russia's complete surrender, Rumania 
has, very naturally, been hopelessly involved. 
And here also Germany's purpose is clearly 
manifest. Germany wants, and has wanted for 
years, full control of the mouth of the Danube 
because of its relation to what might be termed 
the interior water route to the Near East. 
Therefore the only terms of peace which 
Rumania could secure (and Rumania had to 
take what she could get) involved the cession 
to Bulgaria — which is to Germany — of Do- 
brudja and its northern boundary the Danube, 
including the mouth of the river. Rumania 



"World Empire or Downfall" 95 

has thus had to give up her entire coastline 
and is hemmed in on all sides by Teutonic 
nations, so that she must either give up 
her national existence or become a German 
vassal. Under these circumstances Germany 
would control all the oil wealth of Rumania 
— which is very great — and all Rumania's grain, 
which also is a tremendous asset. 

Therefore, for the next war in Europe, 
Germany intends to be well fed, intends that 
her army and her people shall be able to have 
the fat of the land — and this will happen — if, 
of course, we allow the present arrangements to 
continue. Germany, moreover, has taken care 
to provide herself with every item of raw 
material of which Europe and Asia boast. 
Nothing is to be lacking except the one ele- 
ment — rubber — which is indigenous only to 
tropical climates. It remains now only for 
Germany to bring the present struggle to a 
close so that she can begin to consolidate these 
accessions to her dominion, to stabilize and 
perfect their governments in accordance with 
her interests, and her preparations for the 
next war will be practically complete. 



CHAPTER VI 

Germany's peace drives — past and to come 

We have seen in the preceding pages that 
if we follow to their logical conclusion the 
ambitious dreams of Germany, we are forced to 
the inference that the German plan involves 
the extension of the Teutonic boundary line 
to the west. We have seen that Germany has 
been checked in this ambition, and that — 
since not in this war can it be realized — she has 
deliberately set about, while this war is still 
in progress, to prepare for another war to be 
fought later; and further, that she has suc- 
ceeded in forging the needed links which 
bind to herself the producers of all necessary 
raw materials for war, and hence in this respect 
is eminently ready. 

What then is Germany's next move? Having 
accomplished in the east what she set out to 
accomplish, and recognizing her inability to 
push on in the west, Germany wants peace. 

96 



Germany's Peace Drives 97 

We may, then, expect strong peace waves to 
be sent out, an intense propaganda to influence 
civilian sentiment, in order that the ground 
may be prepared for a definite peace proposal. 
This proposal, when it comes, will take the 
form of an offer of extensive concessions in 
the west in return for a free hand in the adjust- 
ment of eastern matters. 

But Germany does not want peace for the 
sake of peace, but peace for the sake of war; 
peace so that, relatively unscathed by the 
present conflict, she may, when the time is 
ripe, launch another war in which her full aims 
may be realized. 

In the conferences with Russia at Brest- 
Litovsk, peace was Germany's for the asking. 
But she declined to ask it or to take it, although 
she expressed herself ready to accept the 
principles which the Bolshevik delegates put 
forth. Failing to agree on details, Russia 
announced that a state of war with Germany 
no longer existed and disbanded the Russian 
army. Without going through the formality 
of making a peace agreement, Germany, then, 
was left with all she had asked for; every 
point on which disagreement existed at Brest- 



98 German Plans for the Next War 

Litovsk was automatically decided in Ger- 
many's favor. 

Did Germany then take what she had 
claimed and cease fighting? Quite the contrary. 
Ignoring the terms of the armistice which she 
had made, just as she ignored her treaties in 
1914, Germany recommenced hostilities, and, 
having deceived the Russians into disbanding 
their army, advanced almost unopposed upon 
Petrograd. Germany's object in this is not to 
hold the Russian capital. But she does intend 
to get firmly within her grasp Courland, 
Livonia, Lithuania and Ukraine (the last 
mentioned of course under the guise of a 
separate treaty of peace). When her hold on 
these provinces is secure, Germany will, if she 
cannot get a better settlement, propose to the 
Allies a peace based on a free hand in the east 
in return for the abandonment of occupied 
Belgium and France, with perhaps an indem- 
nity in order that they may be reconstituted. 

Teutonic reasoning in such a case is not 
difficult to follow. Germany knows the temper, 
the mental processes, the general attitude of 
the civihan populations of the Allied countries. 
What would the great mass of the American 



Germany's Peace Drives 99 

people feel if Germany were to make such a 
proposal? Many of our people, taught to 
believe that we are at war because Belgium 
was invaded and France struck down; taught 
that we are fighting for a governmental prin- 
ciple, for humanity and for civilization, inter- 
preted in terms of western Europe, do not for 
the most part understand that we have any 
interest in far-off Russia, in more-distant Meso- 
potamia and Persia. The Balkan States are 
outside of the realm of our national ken; 
hazily we remember that there was a war there 
in 1912; but what it was about and its rela- 
tion to the present conflict we do not realize. 
We do not know that our interests are as 
closely wrapped up in the history of the Balkan 
Peninsula, and in what happens to these small 
countries through the war, as if they were 
geographically as close as the island of Cuba. 
Consequently, when Germany comes to us with 
the proposition that she will vacate her western 
conquests, will even pay an indemnity for the 
devastation she has wrought, will or will not the 
majority of us want peace to come, believing 
that we have obtained the results for which 
we took up arms-f" 



loo German Plans for the Next War 

The same though in less degree is true of the 
mass of British and French peoples. But being 
more centralized, not scattered over an enor- 
mous area as is the population of the United 
States, these peoples are more easy to reach 
and to teach. 

But if America demands peace, France and 
England may have to follow our lead. It is 
doubtful now if either nation could stand the 
blow of America making peace with Germany. 
And yet that is what Germany is trying to 
accomplish. She is willing to go to any lengths 
to induce us to withdraw from the struggle, 
feeling sure that, in such event, France and 
England will have no choice. With the fulfill- 
ment of the German aims in Russia therefore, 
we shall see a tremendous effort on the part 
of Germany to obtain peace, with France and 
Belgium held out as baits. 

This procedure is nothing new. At various 
times during the past two years Germany 
has done the same thing. Having obtained 
in the east what she desired — and this was 
accomplished before the end of 191 5 — Germany 
has seized every occasion that seemed propitious 
to sound the Entente on a peace program. 



Germany's Peace Drives loi 

These occasions have in almost every case 
been signalized by a German victory. Let us 
see how well they have synchronized. Germany 
was told at the Marne that she was not to be 
permitted to win the war. Thrown back from 
Paris, she stretched out her hand for Calais, 
only to have her knuckles rapped at the Battle 
of Ypres. Later, the other hand, stretching 
again at Calais, was forced to be withdrawn, 
smarting with the pain of another rapping, 
delivered also at Ypres. Again, the lesson of 
these battles was emphasized in Russia before 
Riga. After a triumphal march through Poland, 
beginning at the Dunajec River at the gates 
of Silesia and ending only at the banks of the 
Dwina, the German army, just as it was about 
to seize control of Russia through a complete 
military decision, was suddenly halted and 
pinned fast at the great Tirul Marsh. 

Then it was that the first peace overture 
was made. Germany did not speak openly of 
course; she never does. But the subterranean 
channel of the German propaganda was used 
to test the sentiment of the Entente. The 
effort, however, was weak and non-productive. 
The western Allies had not yet begun to fight; 



102 German Plans for the Next War 

they were only accumulating power. So the 
seed fell on sterile soil. After waiting to give 
her propaganda time to sink in, Germany, 
when she saw that no progress was being made, 
pulled in her horns and delayed further efforts 
for a more auspicious occasion — an occasion 
which she later attempted to create. 

The attack on Serbia, which was the nearest 
approach to a definitive campaign that Ger- 
many had fought, was the next step. When 
the destruction of the Serbs was complete, 
Germany again bid for peace, through the 
same channels — insidious propaganda. But 
this peace drive, somewhat more forceful than 
its predecessor, was broken on the rock of the 
Allies' sense of decency and right, and as 
before, dissolved in mist. 

Then came the Battle of Verdun, the most 
terrific defeat of the war, which was interrupted 
four months after its inception by the Battle 
of the 5omme. This battle is an extremely 
important consideration in connection with 
the German peace moves. Teutonic leaders 
boasted and sincerely believed that their Hnes 
on the western front were too strong to be 
successfully attacked. All of the world's knowl- 



Germany's Peace Drives 103 

edge of military engineering had been exhausted 
in preparing them for defense. Germany did 
not even consider the possibility that they 
could be beaten in to the point of endangering 
any part of their positions. But slowly, yard 
by yard, the French and British plowed their 
way through, preparing their attacks with a 
weight of artillery that Germany did not 
dream they possessed. It was the first positive 
proof that Germany had been given that their 
lines could be strained to the breaking point; 
it was a proof Germany could not ignore. There 
was no longer even in the German mind the 
complete belief in a German victory in the 
west. Even to them it had become improbable. 
As the French and British artillery continued 
to hammer this thought relentlessly into the 
German mind, another peace propaganda was 
started. This time it was more widespread, 
more determined, and more effective than any 
of its predecessors. This effort was very in- 
sidious, far-reaching and well disguised, and not 
altogether unsuccessful. It was at this period, 
in December 1916, that the President of the 
United States, although disclaiming German 
instigation, moved for peace on the basis 



104 German Plans for the Next War 

Germany ostensibly desired, a peace without 
victory. 

But this also failed, the answer of the Allies 
being a new offensive in the west, more pressing, 
more disastrous in its effect on the German 
casualty lists than the Battle of the Somme. 

Having failed to obtain results through 
political channels, an appeal was made to 
the head of the Church of Rome, Pope Benedict. 
There was founded in Switzerland in the 
spring of 1917 an organization known as "The 
Catholic International Peace League" (shades 
of the Holy Alliance!), an organization made 
up almost entirely of German and Austrian 
Catholics. A delegation from this organization 
in the early summer went to Rome to induce 
the Pope to try to arrange for peace. At the 
same time all possible pressure was exerted 
through the person of the Austrian Emperor 
and by the Austrian cardinals. The result was 
all that Germany expected in so far as the 
Pope was concerned. Pope Benedict, in August 
191 7, made a plea to the warring powers to 
conclude a peace on the general basis which had 
been outlined by President Wilson eight months 
before, a peace without victory, a peace the 



Germany's Peace Drives 105 

basis of which should be no annexations and no 
indemnities. 

But just as Germany had failed to stir up a 
Holy Mohammedan war through the call of the 
Turkish Sultan, so the mass of Catholics in 
the world refused to respond to the Pope's 
message. The truth was that the AUies had 
by this time come to know Germany and to 
understand her methods. The lessons which 
she had spent three years in teaching had been 
well learned. The Allies realized that if they 
did not win the war, they would lose it; they 
realized that if peace were made on the basis 
of the drawn game, with an ostensible return 
to the status quo ante, it would be a German 
peace and a German victory. Therefore 
although this effort did elicit a reply — the 
position of the Pope entitled him to that no 
matter in whose interests his proposals were 
made — the attempt to obtain peace went the 
way of its predecessors. 

And then early in 191 8 arose the Russian 
situation, Russia thoroughly in the grip of the 
Teutonic hordes; Russia, without a force of 
any kind, however meager, to oppose a German 
attack, after Germany's terms of peace had 



io6 German Plans for the Next War 

been completely acceded to. And on top of 
this came a terrific German drive in the West 
to make the Allies more receptive to a new 
peace plan. 

If therefore we may judge from historical 
precedents which this war has already fur- 
nished us with, we shall sooner or later see a 
renewal of this peace propaganda in a more 
virulent form than ever. On our answer to 
this proposal — and I am speaking to Great 
Britain, France, and Italy as well as to the 
United States — will depend the fate of the 
world; on our answer will rest the decision 
as to whether international right shall prevail 
over brute force and lustful aggression, whether 
the world shall continue to be inhabited by 
free peoples, or whether it shall become Teu- 
tonic to the complete obliteration of all ether 
nationality and race. For if Germany is per- 
mitted to emerge from this war with a profit, 
whether it be east or west; if she is permitted to 
make peace without it having been drilled into 
the German mind that war does not pay, she 
will fight again as soon as she can get ready, 
and, this next time, will achieve her ambitions 
in full. 



CHAPTER VII 

GERMAN HOSTILITY TO THE UNITED STATES 
BEFORE THE PRESENT WAR 

If within the next twenty-five years, Germany 
should launch another war on Europe, what 
would be the effect on America? Why should 
we be concerned with it? Previous to August 
1914, there existed a popular superstition, 
usually referred to as Germany's traditional 
friendship for the United States. This super- 
stition seems, however, to owe its origin to 
Prussia's traditional hatred of England rather 
than to any feeling of friendship for a people 
whose every principle of government was 
directly antithetical to all that Prussia repre- 
sented. During the American Revolution, 
Frederick the Great stated to an American dip- 
lomat that Prussia rejoiced at every American 
victory. This was accepted as indicative of 
a real feeling of friendship and was the begin- 
ning of the fiction which eventually was to 

107 



io8 German Plans for the Next War 

conceal the true Prussian state of mind. But 
Prussia — and the Prussia of the beginning of 
the 19th century is truly the Germany of the 
20th — as a matter of fact has not only been 
secretly hostile to us almost from the beginning 
of our existence as a nation, but has at heart 
despised us. 

We achieved our mdepenaence when Europe 
first began to throb with the birth pains of a 
new republican spirit, when the trenchant pen 
of Voltaire had begun to loosen the foundations 
upon which rested the French monarchy of the 
Bourbons. Prussia heard the rumbhngs of this 
new spirit with alarm. The very life of her 
entire system depended upon monarchy. Wor- 
shiping even then the gospel of the rule of 
might, of force, she believed that the only 
essential possession of a state was a supreme 
military organization. Having that, all else 
could be attained. But such an organization 
was incompatible with republicanism. Gov- 
ernment by the people, rather than by a single 
ruler responsible only to himself, is not an 
organization calculated to plan aggressive war. 
Government by autocracy labors under no 
such disadvantages. Where one man's voice 



German Hostility to the United States 109 

is law, where there is no accountability to 
an electorate, the mobilization and directing 
of all the resources and all the power of a 
state, the unification and concentration of its 
effort — all toward one goal — is entirely possi- 
ble and is not, indeed, particularly difficult 
of accomplishment. Moreover, such a govern- 
ment is soulless, it is machine-made and 
machine-directed. But it is a perfect war- 
making conception. A republic, or a democracy, 
is adapted primarily to the practice of the 
arts of peace. It is to a certain extent ideal- 
istic; and, pitted against monarchy on the 
battlefield, works with obvious disadvantage. 

All this Prussia reaHzed, and, being an essen- 
tially war-making state, was visibly perturbed 
at the possibility of the republican spirit in- 
fecting not her own population alone, but also 
that of the other German states, not yet united 
under the Confederation. 

The events of the decade following the war 
of 1 81 2 tended to augment greatly this per- 
turbation. The spirit of independence, the love 
of individual liberty which had first infected 
us and had led us to break from the empire of 
George III (a German Prince, be it noted, and 



no German Plans for the Next War 

not an Anglo-Saxon) and later inspired the 
people of France, quickly spread to other parts 
of the world. The Spanish colonies in South 
America, taking advantage of Spain's pre- 
occupation in the affairs of Europe, threw off 
the Spanish yoke, and declared their inde- 
pendence. To Prussia, this proved the breaking 
point. The principles advocated by those 
favoring republicanism were becoming too 
popular; so Prussia took the first step to 
crush the spirit of popular government once 
for all and to stop the schismatic and heretical 
disbelief in the divine right of kings to rule. 

Under the guise of promoting the interests 
of Christianity, the King of Prussia effected 
a combination with the Emperor of Austria — 
another autocrat — and Alexander of Russia, 
a religious fanatic; this combination being 
known as the Holy Alliance. The real object 
of this alliance was anti-Christian. It was not 
religious but political — to put down the in- 
surrections which were rampant in the Spanish 
colonies, and to check the growth of repubHcan 
tendencies throughout the world. Since the 
United States, by its action in 1776, was 
truly the cornerstone of the great temple 



German Hostility to the United States 1 1 1 

of personal freedom, it was really at the 
United States, its Declaration of Independence, 
and its constitutional rule that the Prussian 
blow was aimed; not at the Government itself, 
but at the principle on which the Government 
was founded. It was the first act of German 
antagonism. 

Fortunately for us, the British Premier, Lord 
Canning, became aware of the real nature of 
the Prussian scheme and, acting on the in- 
formation furnished by him to our Minister, 
Mr. Rush, President Monroe announced to the 
world the policy by which we proposed to be 
governed in all questions between Europe and 
the American continent. This policy, our 
code of foreign relations, is the Monroe Doc- 
trine, and, be it noted, it was leveled at 
Prussian aggression. That was the beginning 
of Prussia's virulent hostility toward us. It 
was often cloaked, often tempered by expedi- 
ency to the point where, as a people, we felt 
that, at bottom, we had the German friendship 
and good will. But underlying all German 
protestations of attachment to us and to our 
institutions, there was always a bitter resent- 
ment at our balking the purposes of the Holy 



112 German Plans for the Next War 

Alliance and frustrating the scheme to place 
and keep the greater portions of the Ameri- 
can continent under the rule of European 
autocracy. 

Prussia alone was not strong enough as a 
power to take openly a position of unfriendliness. 
Our rapid growth, our potential strength, and 
the development of our huge resources pro- 
hibited such a position. Moreover, the Prussian 
attitude was not reflected in the other German 
states. But after the formation of the present 
German Empire in 1870 with Prussia the 
dominant state and the King of Prussia the 
nation's emperor, the smoldering embers of 
the resentment over the Monroe Doctrine 
were fanned into flame and Germany's attitude 
changed into a constant challenge of our 
rights, the Monroe Doctrine being the prin- 
cipal object of attack. 

The new Germany came into existence under 
the guidance of Bismarck, the most astute as 
well as the most unscrupulous statesman of 
Europe. He saw as an end only the aggrandize- 
ment of Germany, and to him the end justified 
the means, whatever they might be. He saw in 
the United States only a step by which Ger- 



German Hostility to the United States 113 

many might rise to still greater power, American 
wealth was to him part of the potential wealth 
of Germany, which, when the time was ripe, 
she would reach out her hand and take. His 
whole philosophy about America was summed 
up in his remark that the United States was 
a fat hog, waiting to be stuck, and he might 
have added, that Germany some day would 
try to do the sticking. He was the first Pan- 
German and from this protagonist has come the 
dream of German world dominion from which 
sprang the World War. Although Bismarck 
and his successors in office maintained, for the 
most part, a semblance of friendship for the 
United States, there were constant outcroppings 
of hostility, which, if we had not been blinded 
by the false sense of security furnished by the 
two oceans by which we are limited, we would 
not have been slow to recognize. And recogni- 
tion would have meant some sensible plan of 
preparation for the war in which we are now 
engaged. 

Several small incidents served to warn our 
Government that this hostihty existed and 
that any show of friendliness was only a pre- 
tence demanded by expediency, but it was not 



114 German Plans for the Next War 

until 1898 that the American people as a whole 
received their first warning. The trouble 
started before we declared war on Spain, 
through an insult given by Prince Henry of 
Prussia to Admiral Dewey in Hong Kong. An 
apology was forthcoming, it is true, but the 
intention was evident and did not escape Dewey 
or the Government. 

Later, when it seemed evident that we were 
to declare war on Spain, Germany endeavored 
by all the means in her power, to form against 
us a European coalition headed by herself and 
Austria, and to use the armies and navies of 
the various states concerned to forbid our going 
to war. The real reason for this step was the 
same which prompted Germany to form the 
Triple Alliance which provoked the Monroe 
Doctrine — to prevent the spread of republican- 
ism on this continent and its neighboring 
islands. Through the action of the British, 
who refused to join the coalition, the scheme 
was balked. But Germany was not yet ready 
to acknowledge her defeat. 

Her subsequent actions are well known 
though, at this time, but little remembered 
or appreciated at their full value. 



German Hostility to the United States 115 

After the defeat by Admiral Dewey's 
squadron of the Spanish squadron at Manila, 
and before the land defenses of Manila Bay 
were taken, Dewey established a blockade and 
proclaimed to neutral powers the fact of the 
blockade's existence. Under international law, 
when a blockade is declared neutrals first 
ascertain whether it is effective and hence 
binding, and, upon assuring themselves that 
such is the case, must accept the anchorages 
which the blockading commander assigns to 
them. The German squadron at Manila, which 
was under the command of Admiral Von 
Diederich, undertook to disregard completely 
the instructions of Admiral Dewey as to the 
location of his anchorages, a proceeding to 
which Dewey took very serious objection. In 
fact the German boats undertook to come in 
and out of the Bay as if no blockade existed in 
theory or in fact. Finally a German cruiser 
loaded supplies to the occupants of the belea- 
guered Spanish fortresses, a clear violation of 
neutrality if not, indeed, an act of war. This 
proved the end of Dewey's patience and he 
sent an ultimatum to the German admiral 
which was all but a challenge to fight. There 



ii6 German Plans for the Next War 

was then a temporary back down. The Germans 
were not ready to press the point too hard, 
and Admiral von Diederich disavowed the 
action of his subordinate. 

Later, however, when Dewey began the 
battle of Manila Bay by driving his ships in 
against the Spanish fortresses, the Germans 
attempted to get Dewey's fleet between them- 
selves and the Spanish batteries. Whether it 
was the intention to open fire simultaneously 
with the Spanish guns or not, will never be 
known. Whatever the plan was, it was cir- 
cumvented by the British fleet which immediate- 
ly placed itself between the German and the 
American fleets so that the Germans could 
not fire on Dewey's vessels without hitting 
the British. Germany had no idea of chal- 
lenging the power of the British navy, although 
for the possession of the Philippines they 
might have tried issues with ours. Therefore 
they fell back and in a few days left the harbor. 
But as may be seen the entire attitude was 
one of open unfriendliness which they were 
ready to extend to hostility if a propitious 
moment presented itself. 

Not until 1902 did Germany make the next 



German Hostility to the United States 117 

positive move against us. Venezuela owed 
to Germany, in common witli several of the 
other European powers, large sums of money 
which Germany persuaded the other powers 
to join her in trying to collect. Accordingly 
the now famous Pacific blockade was formed. 
But it developed that it was Germany's inten- 
tion to go further than this. She wished to 
occupy at least a part of Venezuela temporarily, 
presumably until the debt was paid. It was 
a direct challenge to the Monroe Doctrine, 
but a challenge which Germany made alone, 
as the other powers stood out for arbitration 
and refused to join in such an obvious land- 
hunting expedition. But President Roosevelt 
proved conclusively to the German ambassador 
that he was ready to engage the United States 
in war for the protection of this long-standing 
and very necessary foreign policy, and the 
Kaiser, who was behind the move from the 
beginning, was forced to back down and join 
the other powers in the arbitration. 

Germany has tried therefore to force us to 
abandon the Monroe Doctrine. Not resting 
on these manifest efforts, however, she has 
been constantly and for a long time preparing 



Ti. 



Ii8 German Plans for the Next War 

the ground in a way which we could not take 
objection to. In order to get her grip on South 
America just as she did in the case of Turkey 
and tried to do with China, she has sent her 
soldiers to several of the smaller countries of 
South America to train the local armies. She 
has sent out under the direction of her Foreign 
Office, large settlements to Brazil and Argentina, 
which are German, always will be German, 
and have not the slightest intention of permit- 
ting themselves to become assimilated with 
the local populations. 

Only during 1916 and 1917 did we learn 
the extent to which we were permeated by her 
spy system, how she was organized here in 
the United States for war or for sabotage, 
how she had carefully selected even the parts 
of the United States in which her settlers 
should take root, assembling them in localities 
where the German leaders felt they could 
most effectively cooperate against us in case 
of war. Careful lists have been kept of the men 
here who could be counted upon to work in 
the interests of Germany, and these men have 
been used to the utmost. The now famous 
Zimmermann letter, in which Germany pro- 



German Hostility to the United States 119 

posed to give Mexico, in case of war between 
the United States and Germany, large stretches 
of our territory in return for cooperative of- 
fensive measures against us, is public property, 
still fresh in our minds. 

In view of these evidences of hostility, we 
should indeed be addle-pated optimists if we 
did not realize the danger we are in. In the 
opening chapter of this book, we have seen that 
Germany's scheme involved expansion to the 
west in Europe. The relation to the United 
States of the Pan-German scheme was not 
mentioned. But the European matter was 
foremost in the German mind and was the 
first step which had to be taken. But Germany 
did not intend to stop there. There is too 
much wealth in this "fat hog, waiting to be 
stuck," as Bismarck called us, not to excite the 
envy and cupidity of Berlin. And we know 
enough now, or should know enough, to realize 
that when Germany wants anything and it is 
worth the price, she will go to war to get it. 
The only question involved is: Will it pay? 
not Is it right .^ 

If we had remained neutral, and Germany 
won the war, Germany would have the guns 



I20 German Plans for the Next War 

and we would have the money. To this state 
of affairs, there is but one answer. But lest 
we think that this is questionable, there may- 
be cited several incidents which will prove that 
Germany would, in such case, send her guns 
to get the money. In 1898, Admiral Dewey 
was told by the German Admiral von Goetzen, 
that **in about fifteen years my country will 
begin a great war. Some months after we have 
done our job in Europe we shall take New 
York and probably Washington, and we shall 
keep them for a time. We shall extract one or 
two billions of dollars from New York and 
other towns." You may say that it was nearly 
twenty years ago that this spirit was manifested. 
Even so; has it become apparent in any way 
that this spirit has changed for the better.'' 
On the contrary, has it not been carefully 
fostered until it is still more gross, still more 
unscrupulous.^ The Kaiser himself has said 
to the American Ambassador that he will 
stand no nonsense from America after the war. 
What is this if not an open threat to dictate 
to us after the war and put us in our proper 
place with reference to Germany? 

But there is something more definite even 



German Hostility to the United States 121 

than this, something of which our Ambassador 
was cognizant and of which the Foreign Re- 
lations Committee in both the House of 
Representatives and Senate were apprised. 
The Germans, with their genius for detail, 
were keeping a list of the men in their army 
who were alleged to be killed or wounded 
through the use of American ammunition 
supplied to the Allies. This list was translated 
into dollars and cents, the value of each man 
being made to depend upon his rank and 
station. This was to be the indemnity we were 
to be made to pay after the war. By January 
1917, it had reached an inconceivable sum, a 
sum sufficiently large to pay the entire cost 
to Germany of the war. And we may be cer- 
tain that the alternative with which we would 
have been confronted, would have been to 
pay or fight. 

Do not let us deceive ourselves that this 
"debt" will be canceled by the treaty of 
peace; on the contrary it will be merely sus- 
pended. And if Germany can succeed in 
making a peace now that will permit her to 
fight again, we shall be involved in the next war 
and involved not in Europe but in America, 



122 German Plans for the Next War 

for Germany will build her fences well in 
Latin America before that time comes and will 
fight us from the south as well as from the 
east. The Monroe Doctrine will become an 
issue of the past, Germany will pay no more 
attention to it than she has done to her treaties 
with Belgium and with us since 1914. 

Wide preparations have already been made 
in Latin America to aid Germany in this 
American enterprise. Large colonies of Ger- 
mans have been established in many South 
American states, and colonists, under the 
direction of Berlin, have formed compact 
centralized settlements, with their own munic- 
ipal organizations, their own clubs (among 
which are many rifle clubs) — waiting only the 
German word to strike. In Peru, for example, 
there are two thousand Germans; in Paraguay, 
three thousand; in Colombia, three thousand; 
in Venezuela, five thousand; in Uruguay, 
five thousand; in Chili, fifteen thousand; 
in Argentina, sixty thousand; in Brazil, four 
hundred thousand. These numbers are not 
scattered over the various states, be it remem- 
bered; they are concentrated, mobilized in 
fact, waiting but for orders from Berlin. 



German Hostility to the United States 123 

The following appears in Otto Tannenberg's 
work, "Greater Germany, the Work of the 
Twentieth Century," published in 191 1: 

"Germany will take under her protection the 
republics of Argentina, Chili, Uruguay, and Para- 
guay, the Southern third of Bolivia . . . and also 
that part of Southern Brazil in which German 
culture prevails. . . . Chili and Argentina will pre- 
serve their language and their autonomy, but we 
shall require that German be taught in the schools 
as a second language. Southern Brazil, Paraguay 
and Uruguay are countries of German culture and 
there German will be the national tongue." 

Should this prophecy ever be fulfilled, we 
shall again have to fight for independence, 
and, as before, it will be against the aggression 
of a Teuton prince. 



CHAPTER VIII 

NO PEACE WITHOUT VICTORY 

The foregoing pages have depicted a condi- 
tion which threatens the future peace of the 
world. At a moment when we see the world 
torn to pieces in the most Titanic struggle of 
history; when we see being poured out upon the 
battlefields of Europe the lives of the world's 
best and bravest men, and all of the world's 
treasure; when we are called upon to send our 
beloved sons into the maw of the cannon's 
mouth, and to endure ourselves suffering and 
want in order that our men may "carry on"; 
in such a situation we see, formed from the 
breath of a foul, barbaric nation, the hellish 
specter of another war to be fought as soon as 
the monster can complete the preparations 
even now going on. We see this future struggle 
waged for the same cause as that for which we 
are now engaged, for peace, for civilization, for 
the right of future generations to live and 

124 



No Peace Without Victory 125 

breathe God's free air without Teutonic sanc- 
tion. 

There is but one solution to the awful problem 
which confronts us. Regardless of the cost in 
men and treasure, this war must go on and on 
until, through victory, we can so dictate the 
terms of peace, that Germany cannot fight 
again and throw the entire world into another 
such paroxysm of blood and slaughter. But 
before such terms can be drawn up, there are 
certain underlying facts we must understand 
lest we be drawn into a premature peace, 
thinking we have attained the ends for which 
we are fighting when we have not. 

The first of these facts is the nature of our 
enemy. Germany has never waged a war for 
any cause but profit. Never has she been 
stirred to fight for national standards or na- 
tional ideals, — because the only ideal Germany 
possesses is profit. Germany is the tabernacle 
of materialism and the German Kaiser is its 
high priest. This, perhaps, is so because Ger- 
many has grown into an empire solely through 
military conquest. Germany represents not a 
peaceful growth but a steady accretion formed 
by preying on neighboring states. Worship- 



126 German Plans for the Next War 

ing only a money god, and having seen that 
war has always proved for them a profitable 
enterprise, Germany has come to recognize as 
the guiding principle of the world, not the 
philosophy of Christ, but that of the brute. 
Force, brute force, is their god and that only 
do they worship. 

Having launched the present cataclysm for 
gain, Germany has already found it the most 
profitable venture on which she has ever em- 
barked. Let us see where this value lies. 

First there is the matter of territory and the 
possibilities, exclusive to Germany, which it 
opens up. It is difl&cult if not impossible to 
place any definite value in dollars and cents on 
the vast territory which Germany has acquired 
since 1914. Belgium, with all of its coal and 
iron; France, with its great resources in the same 
materials; Russia, with its great granaries, its 
livestock, its wealth in minerals; Anatolia, with 
its great deposits of oil and metals; the value of 
these will run into many billions of dollars. 

Almost as valuable is the exclusive right 
which Germany has obtained to the develop- 
ment of the resources of Turkey, and certain 
important parts of Russia. In addition to 



No Peace Without Victory 127 

this Germany has made many millions through 
selling the products of the French and Belgian 
mines to her destitute allies. Add further the 
indemnities Germany has levied, her thefts of 
private property in the occupied regions, the 
vast collections of art treasures she has re- 
moved and has sent to her capitals, and we have 
a total which staggers the imagination. 

When a people are so constituted that they 
are confirmed in a materialistic philosophy, is 
it to be wondered at that, when they find them- 
selves so richly endowed through war opera- 
tions, they should be addicted to war as a na- 
tional occupation? In Germany, too, we have 
people part of whom regard their country with 
a religious fervor and fanaticism and feel truly, 
if they feel at all, that the acts of Germany's 
rulers are in furtherance of a divine mission 
and that in consequence any opposition to 
these acts is of itself wrong. The other part 
of the population is engaged in the hypocritical 
trade of fostering this fanaticism, of fanning 
the flame it has ignited and of instilling into 
ready minds the doctrine of Germany's superi- 
ority over other peoples of the world and her 
consequent right to exercise world dominion. 



128 German Plans for the Next War 

To this population, part fanatic and part ve- 
nally ambitious, the future peace of the world, 
unless it be an all-German world, is without 
merit and unworthy of consideration. The 
end to be gained is either the immediate ag- 
grandizement of Germany or a peace which will 
provide a basis for future extension of Ger- 
many's boundaries through another war of con- 
quest. 

It is useless to point to the activities of the 
socialistic and pacifist groups in Germany as 
evidence that it will be impossible for Germany 
again to break the bonds of peace, and let loose 
the dogs of war on a heavily burdened world. 
The German socialist is not far removed from 
the Pan-German and the Junker. The socialist 
of Germany had full opportunity in the case of 
Russia to prove his sincerity and force the hand 
of the Junker party, had he so desired. The 
Bolsheviki of Russia offered peace on a basis 
which German socialists claimed was just. 
Germany was waging a war of defense and of 
defense only said the socialists; she desired 
only to live and let live; and to live within her 
own borders on terms of peace with her neigh- 
bors. But the arrant hypocrisy of the socialist 



No Peace Without Victory 129 

became apparent the moment the Russian 
army had voluntarily given up its power of re- 
sistance. Then there was no question of desir- 
ing peace for the love of peace. Gone were his 
scruples, his creed, his poHtical ideals. His 
vision extended only to land, the undefended 
land of his neighbor which he possessed the 
power to take — and he stretched out his hand 
and took. 

Scheidemann, the socialist leader of the 
Reichstag, is the most obvious hypocrite of 
them all, talking in circles on general subjects. 
When any question arises affecting the army 
or the extension of Germany's boundaries 
through theft from her neighbors, his voice 
and vote are always at the disposal of the mili- 
tary party. He votes for all of the war loans, 
he is on record advocating the retention of 
Belgium; his voice has yet to be heard con- 
demning the treachery against Russia. 

And the German pacifist, what has been his 
record on the war? We may judge of this 
through Maximilian Harden, the leader of the 
pacifists, the "irrepressible foe of Kaiserism'* 
whom the Government, so we are told, would 
give untold sums to be rid of, if only it dared. As 



130 German Plans for the Next War 

if the Government could not still his voice and 
break his pen if it so desired! We have learned 
of the power of the German censor; his un- 
questioned ability to prevent the publication of 
any items of news or discussion that do not 
meet with his approval. If, then, Harden is 
still printing what seems republican or pacifist 
matter, is it not because the Government wants 
it printed? And, further, is it not obvious that 
this is done because Harden is one with those 
in power, and that by permitting him to con- 
tinue in his present view the Government is 
merely blinding the world by the show of 
liberahsm? 

If this seems far-fetched, let us see who Har- 
den was, both before the war and since it broke 
out. Before the war he was one of the most 
rabid of the Pan-Germans. In the early pages 
of this book there is a quotation from one of 
his articles which appeared in his paper, the 
Zukunft, in 191 1; in the same year we find the 
following from his pen in the same journal: 

"The hostile arrogance of the Western Powers 
releases us from all our treaty obligations, throws 
open the doors of our verbal prison house and 
forces the German Empire, resolutely defending 



No Peace Without Victory 131 

her vital rights, to revive the ancient Prussian 
policy of conquest." 

In November 1914, we find this Junker- 
pacifist making the statement which has already 
been quoted but which justifies repetition: 

"This war has not been forced on us by surprise; 
we desired it and were right to do so. Germany 
goes into it because of her immutable conviction 
that what she has accomplished gives her the 
right to wider outlets for her activities and more 
room in the world." 

This attitude was maintained consistently 
until 1916 when the possibility of defeat in the 
west dawned. Then this very agile-minded 
gentleman became suddenly converted to paci- 
fism and to a belief in the virtues of democracy. 
This regeneration synchronizes too well with 
the Battle of the Somme to deceive any one 
but a simpleton or a German. We may there- 
fore dismiss as untenable the theory that a war 
after the war will be impossible because of the 
opposition by the socialists and the pacifists. 
There will be no opposition from these sources; 
on the contrary, there will be active cooperation 
if it can be shown that the enterprise will pro- 
duce a profit. 



132 German Plans for the Next War 

An understanding of this phase of Germany — 
the phase of native, inborn hypocrisy — is nec- 
essary to a clear understanding of our enemy 
in this war, for unless we do understand him and 
have a vivid realization of his motives and his 
weapons, there is danger of being caught in the 
snare he is already laying for us — the snare of 
a premature peace. 

But to come to an appreciation of the re- 
quirements of the treaty of peace with which we 
propose to end the war, we must go further; we 
must keep before our mind's eyes constantly 
just what we are fighting for. In so far as the 
United States is concerned — and we are con- 
cerned to the same extent and in the same way 
as the other Entente Powers — we must realize 
that we entered the war solely for self-defense 
— but for the defense of the future as well as of 
the present. The defense of America but for 
the moment is certainly not worth the sacri- 
fices of our men and the pouring out of our 
treasure. If future generations are not to profit 
they should not have to pay the cost, and it is 
upon them that much of the load will fall. Our 
program must therefore include the future 
defense. 



No Peace Without Victory 133 

For the first time in our history we are called 
upon, by unborn generations, to shake off the 
provincialism which our limiting oceans have 
thrust upon us and work out our problem from 
the formula, not of national but of international 
peace and safety. For upon the peace of 
Europe depends the peace of the United States. 
Even if it were true, which it is not, that Ger- 
many does not intend as part of her future plan 
to attack us and extend her damnable system 
into Latin America, the year 1917 has shown 
that it is impossible for a great war to exist in 
Europe without the United States being drawn 
into it. Nations to-day are too closely bound 
by the most intimate commercial ties; the time 
of passage across the ocean is too short to en- 
able any great power to remain neutral in such 
a case. The oceans are not defensive barriers. 
As a matter of history they have brought us 
into four wars in European waters before this. 
In 1797 we began active hostilities against 
France in defense of our right to the sea. For 
the same cause we fought the war of 181 2 and 
two conflicts with the Barbary pirates, one in 
1 801 and one in 181 5. The oceans are lines of 
communication and so they must remain. 



134 German Plans for the Next War 

Modern invention has spanned the gap of 
three thousand miles with a bridge of but three 
and a half days. What affects Europe has 
always affected us. Now it affects us more 
rapidly and vitally than ever before. We have 
not even the isolation of slow communication. 
We could not have it if we would; we would not 
if we could. 

Since, then, we are as intimately concerned 
as are the countries of Europe both with this 
war and with the next, we must clearly under- 
stand the ends for which we are fighting and the 
nature of the war itself. The world must be 
made safe for peace. We are not fighting for 
governmental forms; in this war they mean 
nothing. We are not fighting over international 
boundaries; these mean less. Those things are 
at stake which are bigger than any people, any 
state, any form of government. Decency, 
civiHzation, Christianity are in the balance 
against savagery, barbarism, paganism. Which 
shall rule the world.? The answer to this de- 
termines the nature of our battle. We are not 
concerned with Germany's form of government. 
It is entirely inconsistent with the genius of our 
institutions to attempt to dictate to the people 



No Peace Without Victory 135 

of Germany what form of government they 
should Hve under. But we are concerned in 
the capacity of that government, whatever 
form it may take, for mischief. No nation 
has ever objected to Germany's use of power; 
but her abuse of it we do object to and abomi- 
nate. She has shown that she cannot be trusted 
with power; she should therefore have her power 
shorn from her. 

Without attempting to discuss in detail the 
specific terms of peace which will accomplish 
this, we may lay down, as the principle to which 
the peace treaty must conform, this formula: 
The means, the power, and the ability to make 
war must be forever removed from Germany 
and from all things German. German for- 
tresses must be wrecked, German munition 
plants dismantled; as a war-making state Ger- 
many must cease to exist. The peace treaty 
must be of such a character that, even though 
Germany should break it, her power to do evil, 
through such breach, shall not exist. There 
must be no peace without victory. 

This program must be the American peace 
platform. These are our terms, our irreducible 
minimum. Nor do they represent only a ten- 



136 German Plans for the Next War 

tative sketch to be debated around a conference 
table. And these terms can only be imposed 
upon Germany through the defeat, the disper- 
sion, or the capture of the German army. To 
defeat Germany; to sit with her, not at the 
council table but on the field of battle and, as 
we receive the swords of her commanders, to 
dictate peace — this is what is demanded of us. 

There are, however, those who, in answer to 
the constantly recurring peace waves which the 
German propagandists send forth, contend 
that, in the name of humanity, we should make 
every effort to bring about a conference of the 
leaders of all the warring powers at which their 
differences could be openly discussed and pos- 
sibly reconciled. To enter such a conference 
with a victorious Germany — and Germany is 
the victor up to the moment — would mean a 
surrender of all we have fought for and the 
throwing away of all the sacrifices that the 
world has made. 

This was the experience of Russia. Acting 
on a theory which was supposedly the expres- 
sion of a high idealism, Russia convened the con- 
ference at Brest-Litovsk, and, empty-handed, 
attempted to deal with a Germany gorged 



No Peace Without Victory 137 

with the fruits of conquest. Having nothing 
to exchange, Russia obtained nothing. Not 
only did Germany fail to restore what she had 
stolen, but she added to her thefts. 

Again let us suppose that Germany, at such 
a conference, could be induced to give up with- 
out adequate compensation the loot she has 
acquired and return to the status quo ante. 
What would this lead to? Merely a restoration 
of the situation out of which grew the present 
war. And he would be more than a sentimental 
idealist, he would be a fool, who, having seen a 
certain result spring from a certain cause or 
status, would deny that the same cause or 
status would again produce exactly the same 
result. And were another war to be fought, 
can any one doubt who the victor would be? 
Therefore, as far as the civilized world is con- 
cerned (and this does not include Germany) 
the application of the "No annexations, no 
indemnities" formula would not bring peace. 

Finally, to go into such a conference with 
Germany presupposes equality with Germany. 
Between Germany and any decent people there 
is no common ground; any more than there can 
be common ground between the lust-filled beast 



138 German Plans for the Next War 

that ravishes a woman and the husband of the 
victim. To agree to a return to the status quo 
ante would be to admit either that all the bellig- 
erents are equally guilty — Belgium with Ger- 
many; France and England with Austria; the 
United States, Italy, and Serbia with Bulgaria 
and Turkey — or that none are guilty; that the 
war just happened. But this, on its face, is 
ridiculous; it is untrue; and for the Allies to 
admit it would be to place themselves on a 
plane with Germany, — liars and hypocrites, 
whited sepulchers in whom honor and morality 
have ceased to exist. 

We therefore must all come back to the prin- 
ciple that Germany must be beaten hy force oj 
arms. To this all our energies must be exerted. 
In no circumstances must there be a conference 
until we are in a position to dictate terms by 
virtue of an established and recognized military 
superiority. Better no peace at all than a 
premature peace, a peace by collective bargain- 
ing, a peace by compromise — for a compromise 
means defeat. No man has ever compromised 
with his conscience or with his honor without 
paying the price of ignominy, and it is not 
otherwise with a nation. Our desire for peace 



No Peace Without Victory 139 

for the sake of peace is in every way laudable 
and to our own credit. But this desire must 
not be permitted to lead us into the path of 
opportunism and outweigh our duty to future 
generations. This duty is plainly visible, clear- 
cut, well defined. To its full performance we 
must dedicate all that we are, all that we have. 
Germany must not be permitted to storm the 
citadels of Christianity that she may erect on 
the altar of the Church of Christ the monstrous 
idol of her own materialistic ambition — a world 
dominion. 



THE END. 




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